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CALJrORNIA 

SAN  DIEGO 


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By  Ellen  N.  La  Motte 


The  Tuberculosis  Nurse 
The  Backwash  of  War 


The 
Backwash  of  War 

The  Human  Wreckage  of  the  Battlefield 

as  Witnessed  by  an  American 

Hospital  Nurse 

By 

Ellen  N.  La  Motte 


G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  and  London 

XLbc   fmfc?ierbocfter   press 

1916 


COPTSIGHT,    I916 
BY 

ELLEN  N.  LA  MOTTE 


Vbe  ftnicherboclier  pteu,  Dew  Kork 


MARY  BORDEN-TURNER 

"The  Little  Boss" 

to  whom  i  owe  bit  experience  in 
the  zone  of  the  armies 


INTRODUCTION 

T^HIS  war  has  been  described  as  "Months 
of  boredom,-  punctuated  by  moments 
of  intense  fright."  The  writer  of  these 
sketches  has  experienced  many  "months  of 
boredom,"  in  a  French  military  field  hospi- 
tal, situated  ten  kilometres  behind  the  lines, 
in  Belgium.  During  these  months,  the  lines 
have  not  moved,  either  forward  or  backward, 
but  have  remained  dead-locked,  in  one  posi- 
tion. Undoubtedly,  up  and  down  the  long- 
reaching  kilometres  of  "Front"  there  has 
been  action,  and  "moments  of  intense  fright" 
have  produced  glorious  deeds  of  valour, 
courage,  devotion,  and  nobility.  But  when 
there  is  little  or  no  action,  there  is  a  stagnant 
place,  and  in  a  stagnant  place  there  is  much 
ugliness.      Much  ugliness  is  churned  up  in 

V 


vi  Introduction 

the  wake  of  mighty,  moving  forces.  We  are 
witnessing  a  phase  in  the  evolution  of  hu- 
manity, a  phase  called  War — and  the  slow, 
onward  progress  stirs  up  the  slime  in  the  shal- 
lows, and  this  is  the  Backwash  of  War.  It 
is  very  ugly.  There  are  many  Httle  lives 
foaming  up  in  the  backwash.  They  are 
loosened  by  the  sweeping  current,  and  float 
to  the  surface,  detached  from  their  environ- 
ment, and  one  glimpses  them,  weak,  hideous, 
repellent.  After  the  war,  they  will  consoH- 
date  again  into  the  condition  called  Peace. 

After  this  war,  there  will  be  many  other 
wars,  and  in  the  intervals  there  will  be  peace. 
So  it  will  alternate  for  many  generations. 
By  examining  the  things  cast  up  in  the  back- 
wash, we  can  gauge  the  progress  of  humanity. 
When  clean  little  lives,  when  clean  little 
souls  boil  up  in  the  backwash,  they  will 
consolidate,  after  the  final  war,  into  a  peace 
that  shall  endure.     But  not  till  then. 

E.  N.  L.  M. 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Heroes     3 

La  Patrie  Reconnaissante     . 

17 

The  Hole  in  the  Hedge 

35 

Alone       .... 

49 

A  Belgian  Civilian 

. 

63 

The  Interval  . 

n 

Women  and  Wives  . 

95 

Pour  la  Patrie 

.   115 

Locomotor  Ataxia  . 

129 

A  Surgical  Triumph 

143 

At  the  Telephone  . 

.   159 

A  Citation 

.   167 

An  Incident     , 

.   181 

Heroes 


Heroes 

\  A  7HEN  he  coiild  stand  it  no  longer,  he 
"  "  fired  a  revolver  up  through  the  roof 
of  his  mouth,  but  he  made  a  mess  of  it. 
The  ball  tore  out  his  left  eye,  and  then  lodged 
somewhere  under  his  skull,  so  they  bundled 
him  into  an  ambulance  and  carried  him, 
cursing  and  screaming,  to  the  nearest  field 
hospital.  The  journey  was  made  in  double- 
quick  time,  over  rough  Belgian  roads.  To 
save  his  life,  he  must  reach  the  hospital  with- 
out delay,  and  if  he  was  bounced  to  death 
jolting  along  at  breakneck  speed,  it  did  not 
matter.  That  was  understood.  He  was  a 
deserter,  and  discipline  must  be  maintained. 
Since  he  had  failed-  in  the  job,  his  life  must 
be  saved,  he  must  be  nursed  back  to  health, 
imtil  he  was  well  enough  to  be  stood  up 

3 


4  The  Backwash  of  War 

against  a  wall  and  shot.  This  is  War. 
Things  like  this  also  happen  in  peace  time, 
but  not  so  obviously. 

At  the  hospital,  he  behaved  abominably. 
The  ambulance  men  declared  that  he  had 
tried  to  throw  himself  out  of  the  back  of  the 
ambulance,  that  he  had  yelled  and  hurled 
himself  about,  and  spat  blood  all  over  the 
floor  and  blankets — ^in  short,  he  was  very 
disagreeable.  Upon  the  operating  table, 
he  was  no  more  reasonable.  He  shouted  and 
screamed  and  threw  himself  from  side  to 
side,  and  it  took  a  dozen  leather  straps  and 
four  or  five  orderlies  to  hold  him  in  position, 
so  that  the  surgeon  could  examine  him. 
During  this  commotion,  his  left  eye  rolled 
about  loosely  upon  his  cheek,  and  from  his 
bleeding  mouth  he  shot  great  clots  of  stag- 
nant blood,  caring  not  where  they  fell.  One 
fell  upon  the  immaculate  white  uniform  of  the 
Directrice,  and  stained  her,  from  breast  to 
shoes.    It  was  disgusting.     They  told  him 


Heroes  5 

it  was  La  Directrice,  and  that  he  must  be 
carefiil.  For  an  instant  he  stopped  his 
raving,  and  regarded  her  fixedly  with  his 
remaining  eye,  then  took  aim  afresh,  and 
again  covered  her  with  his  coward  blood. 
Truly  it  was  disgusting. 

To  the  Medecin  Major  it  was  incompre- 
hensible, and  he  said  so.  To  attempt  to  kill 
oneself,  when,  in  these  days,  it  was  so  easy 
to  die  with  honour  upon  the  battlefield,  was 
something  he  could  not  understand.  So 
the  Medecin  Major  stood  patiently  aside, 
his  arms  crossed,  his  supple  fingers  pulling 
the  long  black  hairs  on  his  bare  arms,  wait- 
ing. He  had  long  to  wait,  for  it  was  difficult 
to  get  the  man  under  the  anaesthetic.  Many 
cans  of  ether  were  used,  which  went  to  prove 
that  the  patient  was  a  drinking  man.  Whether 
he  had  acquired  the  habit  of  hard  drink  be- 
fore or  since  the  war  could  not  be  ascertained ; 
the  war  had  lasted  a  year  now,  and  in  that 
time  many  habits  may  be  formed.    As  the 


6  The  Backwash  of  War 

MSdecin  Major  stood  there,  patiently  finger- 
ing the  hairs  on  his  hairy  arms,  he  calculated 
the  amount  of  ether  that  was  expended — 
five  cans  of  ether,  at  so  many  francs  a  can — 
however,  the  ether  was  a  donation  from 
America,  so  it  did  not  matter.  Even  so, 
it  was  wasteful. 

At  last  they  said  he  was  ready.  He  was 
quiet.  During  his  struggles,  they  had  broken 
out  two  big  teeth  with  the  mouth  gag,  and 
that  added  a  little  more  blood  to  the  blood 
already  choking  him.  Then  the  MSdecin 
Major  did  a  very  skilful  operation.  He 
trephined  the  skull,  extracted  the  bullet 
that  had  lodged  beneath  it,  and  bound  back 
in  place  that  erratic  eye.  After  which  the 
man  was  sent  over  to  the  ward,  while  the 
surgeon  returned  hungrily  to  his  dinner, 
long  overdue. 

In  the  ward,  the  man  was  a  bad  patient. 
He  insisted  upon  tearing  off  his  bandages, 
although   they   told   him   that   this   meant 


Heroes  7 

bleeding  to  death.  His  mind  seemed  fixed 
on  death.  He  seemed  to  want  to  die,  and 
was  thoroughly  unreasonable,  although  quite 
conscious.  All  of  which  meant  that  he  re- 
quired constant  watching  and  was  a  perfect 
nuisance.  He  was  so  different  from  the 
other  patients,  who  wanted  to  live.  It  was 
a  joy  to  nurse  them.  This  was  the  Salh  of 
the  Grands  Blesses,  those  most  seriously 
woimded.  By  expert  surgery,  by  expert 
niirsing,  some  of  these  were  to  be  returned 
to  their  homes  again,  reformSs,  mutilated  for 
life,  a  burden  to  themselves  and  to  society; 
others  were  to  be  nursed  back  to  health,  to  a 
point  at  which  they  could  again  shoulder 
eighty  pounds  of  marching  kit,  and  be  torn 
to  pieces  again  on  the  firing  line.  It  was  a 
pleasure  to  nurse  such  as  these.  It  called 
forth  all  one's  skill,  all  one's  humanity. 
But  to  nurse  back  to  health  a  man  who  was 
to  be  court -martialled  and  shot,  truly  that 
seemed  a  dead-end  occupation. 


8  The  Backwash  of  War 

They  dressed  his  wounds  every  day.  Very 
many  yards  of  gauze  were  required,  with 
gauze  at  so  many  francs  a  bolt.  Very  much 
ether,  very  much  iodoform,  very  many  band- 
ages— it  was  an  expensive  business,  con- 
sidering. All  this  waste  for  a  man  who  was 
to  be  shot,  as  soon  as  he  was  well  enough. 
How  much  better  to  expend  this  upon  the 
hopeless  cripples,  or  those  who  were  to  face 
death  again  in  the  trenches. 

The  night  nurse  was  given  to  reflection. 
One  night,  about  midnight,  she  took  her 
candle  and  went  down  the  ward,  reflecting. 
Ten  beds  on  the  right  hand  side,  ten  beds 
on  the  left  hand  side,  all  full.  How  pitiful 
they  were,  these  little  soldiers,  asleep.  How 
irritating  they  were,  these  little  soldiers, 
awake.  Yet  how  sternly  they  contrasted 
with  the  man  who  had  attempted  suicide. 
Yet  did  they  contrast,  after  all?  Were  they 
finer,  nobler,  than  he?  The  night  nurse, 
given  to  reflection,  continued  her  rounds. 


Heroes  9 

In  bed  number  two,  on  the  right,  lay 
Alexandre,  asleep.  He  had  received  the 
Medaille  Militaire  for  bravery.  He  was 
better  now,  and  that  day  had  asked  the 
Medecin  Major  for  permission  to  smoke. 
The  Medecin  Major  had  refused,  saying  that 
it  would  disturb  the  other  patients.  Yet 
after  the  doctor  had  gone,  Alexandre  had 
produced  a  cigarette  and  lighted  it,  defying 
them  all  from  behind  his  Medaille  Militaire. 
The  patient  in  the  next  bed  had  become 
violently  nauseated  in  consequence,  yet  Alex- 
andre had  smoked  on,  secure  in  his  Medaille 
Militaire.     How  much  honoiu-  lay  in  that? 

Here  lay  FeHx,  asleep.  Poor,  querulous, 
feeble-minded  Felix,  with  a  foul  fistula,  which 
filled  the  whole  ward  with  its  pdour.  In 
one  sleeping  hand  lay  his  little  round  mirror, 
in  the  other,  he  clutched  his  comb.  With 
daylight,  he  would  trim  and  comb  his  mous- 
tache, his  poor,  little  drooping  moustache, 
and  twirl  the  ends  of  it. 


10         The  Backwash  of  War 

Beyond  lay  Alphonse,  drugged  with  mor- 
phia, after  an  intolerable  day.  That  morn- 
ing he  had  received  a  package  from  home,  a 
dozen  pears.  He  had  eaten  them  all,  one 
after  the  other,  though  his  companions  in 
the  beds  adjacent  looked  on  with  hungry, 
longing  eyes.  He  offered  not  one,  to  either 
side  of  him.  After  his  gorge,  he  had 
become  violently  ill,  and  demanded  the 
basin  in  which  to  unload  his  surcharged 
stomach. 

Here  lay  Hippolyte,  who  for  eight  months 
had  jerked  on  the  bar  of  a  captive  balloon, 
until  appendicitis  had  sent  him  into  hospital. 
He  was  not  ill,  and  his  dirty  jokes  filled  the 
ward,  provoking  laughter,  even  from  dying 
Marius.  How  filthy  had  been  his  jokes — 
how  they  had  been  matched  and  beaten  by 
the  jokes  of  others.  How  filthy  they  all  were, 
when  they  talked  with  each  other,  shouting 
down  the  length  of  the  ward. 

Wherein  lay  the  difference?    Was  it  not 


Heroes  1 1 

all  a  dead-end  occupation,  nursing  back  to 
health  men  to  be  patched  up  and  returned 
to  the  trenches,  or  a  man  to  be  patched  up, 
court-martialled  and  shot?  The  difference 
lay  in  the  Ideal. 

One  had  no  ideals.  The  others  had  ideals, 
and  fought  for  them.  Yet  had  they?  Poor 
selfish  Alexandre,  poor  vain  Felix,  poor 
gluttonous  Alphonse,  poor  filthy  Hippolyte 
— was  it  possible  that  each  cherished  ideals, 
hidden  beneath?  Courageous  dreams  of 
freedom  and  patriotism?  Yet  if  so,  how 
could  such  beliefs  fail  to  influence  their  daily 
lives?  Could  one  cherish  standards  so  noble, 
yet  be  himself  so  ignoble,  so  petty,  so  com- 
monplace? 

At  this  point  her  candle  burned  out,  so 
the  night  nurse  took  another  one,  and  passed 
from  bed  to  bed.  It  was  very  incomprehen- 
sible. Poor,  whining  Felix,  poor  whining 
Alphonse,  poor  whining  Hippolyte,  poor 
whining  Alexandre — all  fighting  for  La  Patrie. 


12         The  Backwash  of  War 

And  against  them  the  man  who  had  tried 
to  desert  La  Patrie. 

So  the  night  nurse  continued  her  rounds, 
up  and  down  the  ward,  reflecting.  And 
suddenly  she  saw  that  these  ideals  were 
imposed  from  without — that  they  were  com- 
pulsory. That  left  to  themselves,  Felix, 
and  Hippolyte,  and  Alexandre,  and  Alphonse 
would  have  had  no  ideals.  Somewhere, 
higher  up,  a  handful  of  men  had  been  able 
to  impose  upon  Alphonse,  and  Hippolyte, 
and  Felix,  and  Alexandre,  and  thousands  like 
them,  a  state  of  mind  which  was  not  in  them, 
of  themselves.  Base  metal,  gilded.  And 
they  were  all  harnessed  to  a  great  car,  a 
Juggernaut,  ponderous  and  crushing,  upon 
which  was  enthroned  Mammon,  or  the  God- 
dess of  Liberty,  or  Reason,  as  you  like. 
Nothing  further  was  demanded  of  them  than 
their  collective  physical  strength — just  to 
tug  the  car  forward,  to  cut  a  wide  swath,  to 
leave  behind  a  broad  path  along  which  cotdd 


Heroes  13 

follow,  at  some  later  date,  the  hordes  of 
Progress  and  Civilization.  Individual  nobil- 
ity was  superfluous.  All  the  Idealists  de- 
manded was  physical  endurance  from  the 
mass. 

Dawn  filtered  in  through  the  little  square 
windows  of  the  ward.  Two  of  the  patients 
rolled  on  their  sides,  that  they  might  talk 
to  one  another.  In  the  silence  of  early 
morning  their  voices  rang  clear. 

"Dost  thou  know,  mon  ami,  that  when  we 
captiired  that  German  battery  a  few  days 
ago,  we  found  the  gunners  chained  to  their 
gtms?" 

Paris, 
18  December,  1915 


La  Patrie  Reconnaissante 


15 


LA  PATRIE   RECONNAISSANTE 

nPHEY  brought  him  to  the  Poste  de  Secours, 
*  just  behind  the  lines,  and  laid  the 
stretcher  down  gently,  after  which  the 
bearers  stretched  and  restretched  their  stiff- 
ened arms,  numb  with  his  weight.  For  he 
was  a  big  man  of  forty  |  not  one  of  the  light 
striplings  of  the  young  classes  of  this  year  or 
last.  The  wounded  man  opened  his  eyes, 
flashing  black  eyes,  that  roved  about  rest- 
lessly for  a  moment,  and  then  rested  vindic- 
tively first  on  one,  then  on  the  other  of  the 
two  brancardiers. 

"Sales  embusgues!^*  (Dirty  cowards)  he 
cried  angrily.  "How  long  is  it  since  I  have 
been  wounded?  Ten  hours!  For  ten  hours 
have  I  laid  there,  waiting  for  you!  And 
then  you  come  to  fetch  me,  only  when  it  is 

a  17 


1 8         The  Backwash  of  War 

safe!  Safe  for  you!  Safe  to  risk  your  pre- 
cious, filthy  skins!  Safe  to  come  where  I 
have  stood  for  months !  Safe  to  come  where 
for  ten  hours  I  have  laid,  my  belly  opened 
by  a  German  shell !  Safe !  Safe !  How  brave 
you  are  when  night  has  fallen,  when  it  is 
dark,  when  it  is  safe  to  come  for  me,  ten  hours 
late!" 

He  closed  his  eyes,  jerked  up  his  knees, 
and  clasped  both  dirty  hands  over  his  abdo- 
men. From  waist  to  knees  the  old  blue 
trousers  were  soaked  with  blood,  black 
blood,  stiff  and  wet.  The  brancardiers  looked 
at  each  other  and  shook  their  heads.  One 
shrugged  a  shoulder.  Again  the  flashing 
eyes  of  the  man  on  the  stretcher  opened. 

"Sales  embusquSsI'*  he  shouted  again. 
"How  long  have  you  been  engaged  in  this 
work  of  mercy?  For  twelve  months,  since 
the  beginning  of  the  war!  And  for  twelve 
months,  since  the  beginning  of  the  war,  I 
have  stood  in  the  first  line  trenches!    Think 


La  Patrie  Reconnaissante       19 

of  it — twelve  months!  And  for  twelve 
months  you  have  come  for  us — ^when  it  was 
safe!  How  much  younger  are  you  than  I! 
Ten  years,  both  of  you — ten  years,  fifteen 
years,  or  even  more!  Ah,  Nom  de  Dieu,  to 
have  influence !     Influence ! ' ' 

The  flaming  eyes  closed  again,  and  the 
bearers  shuffled  off,  lighting  cheap  cigarettes. 

Then  the  siu*geon  came,  impatiently.  Ah, 
a  grand  blesse,  to  be  hastened  to  the  rear  at 
once.  The  surgeon  tried  to  imbutton  the 
soaking  trousers,  but  the  man  gave  a  scream 
of  pain. 

"For  the  sake  of  God,  cut  them.  Monsieur 
le  Major!  Cut  them!  Do  not  economize. 
They  are  worn  out  in  the  service  of  the  coun- 
try! They  are  torn  and  bloody,  they  can 
serve  no  one  after  me !  Ah,  the  little  econ- 
omies, the  Httle,  false  economies !  Cut  them, 
Monsieur  le  Major!'* 

An  assistant,  with  heavy,  blunt  scissors, 
half  cut,  half  tore  the  trousers  from  the  man 


20         The  Backwash  of  War 

in  agony.  Clouts  of  black  blood  rolled  from 
the  wound,  then  a  stream  bright  and  scarlet, 
which  was  stopped  by  a  handful  of  white 
gauze,  retained  by  tightly  wrapped  bands. 
The  surgeon  raised  himself  from  the  task. 

**  Mon  pauvre  vieux,"  he  miuinured  ten- 
deriy.  "Once  more?"  and  into  the  supine 
leg  he  shot  a  stream  of  morphia. 

Two  ambulance  men  came  in,  Americans 
in  khaki,  ruddy,  well  fed,  careless.  They 
lifted  the  stretcher  quickly,  skilfully.  Marius 
opened  his  angry  eyes  and  fixed  them 
furiously. 

"Sales  Strangersr*  he  screamed.  "What 
are  you  here  for?  To  see  me,  with  my  bowels 
nmning  on  the  ground?  Did  you  come  for 
me  ten  hours  ago,  when  I  needed  you?  My 
head  in  mud,  my  blood  warm  under  me? 
Ah,  not  you!  There  was  danger  then — you 
only  come  for  me  when  it  is  safe!" 

They  shoved  him  into  the  ambulance, 
buckling  down  the  brown  canvas  curtains 


La  Patrie  Reconnaissante       21 

by  the  light  of  a  lantern.  One  cranked  the 
motor,  then  both  clambered  to  the  seat  in 
front,  laughing.  They  drove  swiftly  but 
carefully  through  the  darkness,  carrying  no 
lights.  Inside,  the  man  continued  his  impre- 
cations, but  they  could  not  hear  him. 

"Strangers!  Sightseers!"  he  sobbed  in 
misery.  "Driving  a  motor,  when  it  is  I 
who  should  drive  the  motor!  Have  I  not 
conducted  a  Paris  taxi  for  these  past  ten 
years?  Do  I  not  know  how  to  drive,  to 
manage  an  engine?  What  are  they  here  for 
— France?  No,  only  themselves!  To  write 
a  book — to  say  what  they  have  done — when 
it  was  safe!  If  it  was  France,  there  is  the 
Foreign  Legion — where  they  would  have  been 
welcome — to  stand  in  the  trenches  as  I  have 
done!  But  do  they  enlist?  Ah  no!  It  is  not 
safe!  They  take  my  place  with  the  motor, 
and  come  to  get  me — when  it  is  too  late." 

Then  the  morphia  relieving  him,  he  slept. 


22         The  Backwash  of  War 

In  a  field  hospital,  some  ten  kilometres 
behind  the  lines,  Marius  lay  dying.  For 
three  days  he  had  been  dying  and  it  was 
disturbing  to  the  other  patients.  The  stench 
of  his  wounds  filled  the  air,  his  curses  filled 
the  ward.  For  Marius  knew  that  he  was 
dying  and  that  he  had  nothing  to  fear.  He 
could  express  himself  as  he  chose.  There 
would  be  no  earthly  court-martial  for  him — 
he  was  answerable  to  a  higher  court.  So 
Marius  gave  forth  freely  to  the  ward  his 
philosophy  of  life,  his  hard,  bare,  ugly  life, 
as  he  had  lived  it,  and  his  comments  on  La 
Patrie  as  he  understood  it.  For  three  days, 
night  and  day,  he  screamed  in  his  delirium, 
and  no  one  paid  much  attention,  thinking 
it  was  deliriimi.  The  other  patients  were 
sometimes  diverted  and  amused,  sometimes 
exceedingly  annoyed,  according  to  whether 
or  not  they  were  sleepy  or  suffering.  And 
all  the  while  the  wound  in  the  abdomen  gave 
forth  a  terrible  stench,  filling  the  ward,  for 


La  Patrie  Reconnaissante       23 

he  had  gas  gangrene,  the  odour  of  which  is 
abominable. 

Marius  had  been  taken  to  the  Salle  of  the 
abdominal  wounds,  and  on  one  side  of  him 
lay  a  man  with  a  faecal  fistula,  which  smelled 
atrociously.  The  man  with  the  fistula, 
however,  had  got  used  to  himself,  so  he  com- 
plained mightily  of  Marius.  On  the  other 
side  lay  a  man  who  had  been  shot  through 
the  bladder,  and  the  smell  of  urine  was  heavy 
in  the  air  round  about.  Yet  this  man  had 
also  got  used  to  himself,  and  he  too  com- 
plained of  Marius,  and  the  awful  smell  of 
Marius.  For  Marius  had  gas  gangrene,  and 
gangrene  is  death,  and  it  was  the  smell  of 
death  that  the  others  complained  of. 

Two  beds  farther  down,  lay  a  boy  of 
twenty,  who  had  been  shot  through  the 
liver.  Also  his  hand  had  been  amputated, 
and  for  this  reason  he  was  to  receive  the 
Croix  de  Gicerre.  He  had  performed  no 
special  act  of  bravery,  but  all  mutiles  are 


24         The  Backwash  of  War 

given  the  Croix  de  Guerre,  for  they  will  re- 
cover and  go  back  to  Paris,  and  in  walking 
about  the  streets  of  Paris,  with  one  leg  gone, 
or  an  arm  gone,  it  is  good  for  the  morale  of 
the  country  that  they  should  have  a  Croix 
de  Gtierre  pinned  on  their  breasts.  So  one 
night  at  about  eight  o'clock,  the  General 
arrived  to  confer  the  Croix  de  Guerre  on  the 
man  two  beds  from  Marius.  The  General 
was  a  beautiful  man,  something  like  the 
Russian  Grand  Duke.  He  was  tall  and 
thin,  with  beautiful  slim  legs  encased  in 
shining  tall  boots.  As  he  entered  the  ward, 
emerging  from  the  rain  and  darkness  without, 
he  was  very  imposing.  A  few  rain  drops 
sparkled  upon  the  golden  oak  leaves  of  his 
cap,  for  although  he  had  driven  up  in  a  lim- 
ousine, he  was  not  able  to  come  quite  up 
to  the  ward,  but  had  been  obliged  to  traverse 
some  fifty  yards  of  darkness,  in  the  rain. 
He  was  encircled  in  a  sweeping  black  cloak, 
which  he  cast  off  upon  an  empty  bed,  and 


La  Patrie  Reconnaissante       25 

then,  surrounded  by  his  ghttering  staff,  he 
conferred  the  medal  upon  the  man  two  beds 
below  Marius.  The  little  ceremony  was 
touching  in  its  dignity  and  simplicity. 
Marius,  in  his  delirium,  watched  the  pro- 
ceedings intently. 

It  was  all  over  in  five  minutes.  Then  the 
General  was  gone,  his  staff  was  gone,  and 
the  ward  was  left  to  its  own  reflections. 

Opposite  Marius,  across  the  ward,  lay  a 
little  joyeux.  That  is  to  say,  a  soldier  of 
the  Bataillon  d'Afrique,  which  is  the  criminal 
regiment  of  France,  in  which  regiment  are 
placed  those  men  who  would  otherwise  serve 
sentences  in  jail.  Prisoners  are  sent  to  this 
regiment  in  peace  time,  and  in  time  of  war, 
they  fight  in  the  trenches  as  do  the  others, 
'but  with  small  chance  of  being  decorated. 
Social  rehabilitation  is  their  sole  reward, 
as  a  rule.  So  Marius  waxed  forth,  taunting 
the  little  joyeux,  whose  feet  lay  opposite  his 
feet,  a  yard  apart. 


26         The  Backwash  of  War 

*'Tiensf  My  little  friend!"  he  shouted 
so  that  all  might  hear.  "Thou  canst  never 
receive  the  Croix  de  Guerre,  as  Frangois  has 
received  it,  because  thou  art  of  the  Bataillon 
d'AfriqueJ  And  why  art  thou  there,  my 
friend?  Because,  one  night  at  a  caf6,  thou 
didst  drink  more  wine  than  was  good  for 
thee — so  much  more  than  was  good  for  thee, 
that  when  an  old  boulevardier,  with  much 
money  in  his  pocket,  proposed  to  take  thy 
girl  from  thee,  thou  didst  knock  him  down 
and  give  him  a  black  eye!  Common  braw- 
ler, distiirber  of  the  peace!  It  was  all  due 
to  the  wine,  the  good  wine,  which  made  thee 
value  the  girl  far  above  her  worth!  It  was 
the  wine!  The  wine!  And  every  time  an 
attempt  is  made  in  the  Chamber  to  abolish 
drinking  the  good  wine  of  France,  there  is 
violent  opposition.  Opposition  from  whom? 
From  the  old  boulevardier  whose  money  is 
invested  in  the  vineyards — the  very  man 
who  casts  covetous  eyes  upon  thy  Mimi! 


La  Patrie  Reconnaissante       27 

So  thou  goest  to  jail,  then  to  the  Bataillon 
d'Afriqiie,  and  the  wine  flows,  and  thy  Mimi 
— where  is  she?  Only  never  canst  thou  re- 
ceive the  Croix  de  Guerre,  my  friend — La 
Patrie  Reconnaissante  sees  to  that!" 

Marius  shouted  with  laughter — he  knew 
himself  so  near  death,  and  it  was  good  to  be 
able  to  say  all  that  was  in  his  heart.  An 
orderly  approached  him,  one  of  the  six  young 
men  attached  as  male  nurses  to  the  ward. 

"Ha!  Thou  bidst  me  be  quiet,  sale  em- 
busque?"  he  taunted.  **I  will  shout  louder 
than  the  guns!  And  hast  thou  ever  heard 
the  guns,  nearer  than  this  safe  point  behind 
the  lines?  Thou  art  here  doing  woman's 
work!  Caring  for  me,  nursing  me!  And 
what  knowledge  dost  thou  bring  to  thy  task, 
thou  ignorant  grocer's  clerk?  Surely  thou 
hast  some  powerful  friend,  who  got  thee 
mobiUzed  as  infirmier — a  woman's  task — 
instead  of  a  simple  soldier  like  me,  doing  his 
duty  in  the  trenches ! " 


28         The  Backwash  of  War 

Marius  raised  himself  in  bed,  which  the 
infirmier  knew,  because  the  doctor  had  told 
him,  was  not  a  right  position  for  a  man  who 
has  a  wound  in  his  stomach,  some  thirty 
centimetres  in  length.  Marius,  however, 
was  strong  in  his  delirium,  so  the  infirmier 
called  another  to  help  him  throw  the  patient 
upon  his  back.  Soon  three  were  called,  to 
hold  the  struggling  man  down. 

Marius  resigned  himself.  "Summon  all 
six  of  you!"  he  shouted.  "All  six  of  you! 
And  what  do  you  know  about  illness  such  as 
mine?  You,  a  grocer's  clerk!  You,  barber! 
You,  cultivateur  I  You,  driver  of  the  boat 
train  from  Paris  to  Cherbourg!  You,  agent 
of  the  Gas  Society  of  Paris!  You,  driver  of 
a  Paris  taxi,  such  as  myself!  Yet  here  you 
all  are,  in  your  wisdom,  your  experience,  to 
nurse  me!  Mobilized  as  nurses  because 
you  are  friend  of  a  friend  of  a  deputy! 
Whilst  I,  who  know  no  deputy,  am  mobi- 
lized   in    the    first     line     trenches!     Sales 


La  Patrie  Reconnaissante       29 

emhusgues!  Sales  embusquSsI  La  Patrie 
Reconnaissantel" 

He  laid  upon  his  back  a  little  while,  quiet. 
He  was  very  delirious,  and  the  end  could 
not  be  far  off.  His  black  eyebrows  were 
contracted  into  a  frown,  the  eyelids  closed 
and  quivering.  The  grey  nostrils  were 
pinched  and  dilated,  the  grey  lips  snarling 
above  yellow,  crusted  teeth.  The  restless 
lips  twitched  constantly,  mumbling  fresh 
treason,  inaudibly.  Upon  the  floor  on  one 
side  lay  a  pile  of  coverlets,  tossed  angrily 
from  the  bed,  while  on  each  side  the  bed 
dangled  white,  muscular,  hairy  legs,  the  toes 
touching  the  floor.  All  the  while  he  fumbled 
to  unloose  the  abdominal  dressings,  picking 
at  the  safety-pins  with  weak,  dirty  fingers. 
The  patients  on  each  side  turned  their  backs 
to  him,  to  escape  the  smell,  the  smell  of 
death. 

A  woman  nurse  came  down  the  ward.  She 
was  the  only  one,  and  she  tried  to  cover  him 


30         The  Backwash  of  War 

with  the  fallen  bedding.  Marius  attempted 
to  clutch  her  hand,  to  encircle  her  with  his 
weak,  delirious,  amorous  arms.  She  dodged 
swiftly,  and  directed  an  orderly  to  cover  him 
with  the  fallen  blankets. 

Marius  laughed  in  glee,  a  fiendish,  feeble, 
shrieking  laugh.  "Have  nothing  to  do  with 
a  woman  who  is  diseased!"  he  shouted. 
' '  Never !    Never !    Never ! ' ' 

So  they  gave  him  more  morphia,  that  he 
might  be  quiet  and  less  indecent,  and  not 
disturb  the  other  patients.  And  all  that 
night  he  died,  and  all  the  next  day  he  died, 
and  all  the  night  following  he  died,  for  he  was 
a  very  strong  man  and  his  vitality  was  won- 
derful. And  as  he  died,  he  continued  to 
pour  out  to  them  his  experience  of  life,  his 
summing  up  of  life,  as  he  had  lived  it  and 
known  it.  And  the  sight  of  the  woman  nurse 
evoked  one  train  of  thought,  and  the  sight 
of  the  men  nurses  evoked  another,  and  the 
sight  of  the  man  who  had  the  Croix  de  Guerre 


La  Patrie  Reconnaissante       31 

evoked  another,  and  the  sight  of  the  joyeux 
evoked  another.  And  he  told  the  ward  all 
about  it,  incessantly.     He  was  very  delirious. 

His  was  a  filthy  death.  He  died  after 
three  days'  cursing  and  raving.  Before  he 
died,  that  end  of  the  ward  smelled  foully, 
and  his  foul  words,  shouted  at  the  top  of  his 
delirious  voice,  echoed  foully.  Everyone 
was  glad  when  it  was  over. 

The  end  came  suddenly.  After  very  much 
raving  it  came,  after  terrible  abuse,  terrible 
truths.  One  morning,  very  early,  the  night 
nurse  looked  out  of  the  window  and  saw  a 
little  procession  making  its  way  out  of  the 
gates  of  the  hospital  enclosure,  going  towards 
the  cemetery  of  the  village  beyond.  First 
came  the  priest,  carrying  a  wooden  cross 
that  the  carpenter  had  just  made.  He  was 
chanting  something  in  a  minor  key,  while 
the  sentry  at  the  gates  stood  at  salute.  The 
cortege  passed  through,  numbering  a  dozen 
soldiers,  four  of  whom  carried  the  bier  on 


32         The  Backwash  of  War 

their  shoulders.  The  bier  was  covered  with 
the  glorious  tricolour  of  France.  She  glanced 
instinctively  back  towards  Marius.  It  would 
be  just  like  that  when  he  died.  Then  her 
eyes  fell  upon  a  Paris  newspaper,  lying  on 
her  table.  There  was  a  column  headed, 
"Nos  Ilerosf  Morts  aux  Champs  d'Honneur; 
La  Patrie  Reconnaissante.''  It  would  be 
just  like  that. 

Then  Marius  gave  a  last,  sudden  scream. 

"  Vive  la  France!'^  he  shouted.  "  Vive  les 
sales  embusquSsI    Hoch  le  Kaiser  1" 

The  ward  awoke,  scandalized. 

"  Vive  la  Patrie  Reconnaissante!"  he  yelled. 
''HochleKaiserr 

Then  he  died. 

Paris, 
19  December,  1915 


The  Hole  in  the  Hedge 


33 


THE  HOLE  IN  THE  HEDGE 

nPHE  field  hospital  stood  in  a  field  outside 
■*-  the  village,  surrounded  by  a  thick, 
high  hedge  of  prickly  material.  Within,  the 
enclosure  was  filled  by  a  dozen  little  wooden 
huts,  painted  green,  connected  with  each 
other  by  plank  walks.  What  went  on  out- 
side the  hedge,  nobody  within  knew.  War, 
presumably.  War  ten  kilometres  away,  to 
judge  by  the  map,  and  by  the  noise  of  the 
gims,  which  on  some  days  roared  very  loudly, 
and  made  the  wooden  huts  shake  and  tremble, 
although  one  got  used  to  that,  after  a  fashion. 
The  hospital  was  very  close  to  the  war,  so 
close  that  no  one  knew  anything  about  the 
war,  therefore  it  was  very  dull  inside  the 
enclosure,  with  no  news  and  no  newspapers, 
and   just   quarrels   and   monotonous   work. 

a 


36         The  Backwash  of  War 

As  for  the  hedge,  at  such  points  as  the  prickly 
thorn  gave  out  or  gave  way,  stout  stakes 
and  stout  boarding  took  its  place,  thus  mak- 
ing it  a  veritable  prison  wall  to  those  confined 
within.  There  was  but  one  recognized  en- 
trance, the  big  double  gates  with  a  sentry 
box  beside  them,  at  which  box  or  within  it, 
according  to  the  weather,  stood  a  sentry, 
night  and  day.  By  day,  a  drooping  French 
flag  over  the  gates  showed  the  ambulances 
where  to  enter.  By  night,  a  lantern  served 
the  same  purpose.  The  night  sentry  was 
often  asleep,  the  day  sentry  was  often  absent, 
and  each  wrote  down  in  a  book,  when  they 
thought  it  important,  the  names  of  those 
who  came  and  went  into  the  hospital  groimds. 
The  field  ambulances  came  and  went,  the  hos- 
pital motors  came  and  went,  now  and  then  the 
General's  car  came  and  went,  and  the  people 
attached  to  the  hospital  also  came  and  went, 
openly,  through  the  gates.  But  the  comings 
and  goings  through  the  hedge  were  different. 


The  Hole  in  the  Hedge        37 

Now  and  then  holes  were  discovered  in 
the  hedge.  Holes  underneath  the  prickly 
thorn,  not  more  than  a  foot  high,  but  suffi- 
cient to  allow  a  crawling  body  to  wriggle 
through  on  its  stomach.  These  holes  per- 
sisted for  a  day  or  two  or  three,  and  then 
were  suddenly  staked  up,  with  strong  stakes 
and  barbed  wire.  After  which,  a  few  days 
later,  perhaps,  other  holes  like  them  would 
be  discovered  in  the  hedge  a  little  fiirther 
along.  After  each  hole  was  discovered, 
curious  happenings  would  take  place  amongst 
the  hospital  staff. 

Certain  men,  orderlies  or  stretcher  bear- 
ers, would  be  imprisoned.  For  example, 
the  nurse  of  Salle  I.,  the  ward  of  the  grands 
hlessSs,  would  come  on  duty  some  morning 
and  discover  that  one  of  her  orderlies  was 
missing.  Fouquet,  who  swept  the  ward, 
who  carried  basins,  who  gave  the  men  their 
breakfasts,  was  absent.  There  was  a  beastly 
hitch  in  the  ward  work,   in  consequence. 


38  The  Backwash  of  War 

The  floor  was  filthy,  covered  with  cakes  of 
mud  tramped  in  by  the  stretcher  bearers 
during  the  night.  The  men  screamed  for 
attention  they  did  not  receive.  The  wrong 
patients  got  the  wrong  food  at  meal  times. 
And  then  the  nurse  would  look  out  of  one 
of  the  little  square  windows  of  the  ward,  and 
see  Fouquet  marching  up  and  down  the 
plank  walks  between  the  baracques,  carrying 
his  eighty  pounds  of  marching  kit,  and  smil- 
ing happily  and  defiantly.  He  was  "in 
prison."  The  night  before  he  had  crawled 
through  a  hole  in  the  hedge,  got  blind  drunk 
in  a  neighbouring  estaminet,  and  had  swag- 
gered boldly  through  the  gates  in  the  morn- 
ing, to  be  "imprisoned."  He  wanted  to  be. 
He  just  could  not  stand  it  any  longer.  He 
was  sick  of  it  all.  Sick  of  being  infirmier, 
of  sweeping  the  floor,  of  carrying  vessels, 
of  cutting  up  tough  meat  for  sullen,  one- 
armed  men,  with  the  Croix  de  Guerre  pinned 
to  their  coffee-streaked  night  shirts.     Bah! 


The  Hole  in  the  Hedge        39 

The  Croix  de  Guerre  pinned  to  a  night  shirt, 
egg-stained,  smelling  of  sweat ! 

Long,  long  ago,  before  any  one  thought  of 
war — oh,  long  ago,  that  is,  about  six  years — 
Fouquet  had  known  a  deputy.  Also  his 
father  had  known  the  deputy.  And  so,  when 
it  came  time  for  his  military  service,  he  had 
done  it  as  infirmier.  As  nurse,  not  soldier. 
He  had  done  stretcher  drill,  with  empty 
stretchers.  He  had  swept  wards,  empty  of 
patients.  He  had  done  his  two  years  mili- 
tary service,  practising  on  empty  beds,  on 
empty  stretchers.  He  had  had  a  snap,  be- 
cause of  the  deputy.  Then  came  the  war, 
and  still  he  had  a  snap,  although  now  the 
beds  and  the  wards  were  all  full.  Still, 
there  was  no  danger,  no  front  line  trenches, 
for  he  was  mobilized  as  infirmier,  as  nurse  in 
a  military  hospital.  He  stood  six  feet  tall, 
which  is  big  for  a  Frenchman,  and  he  was 
big  in  proportion,  and  he  was  twenty-five 
years  old,  and  ruddy  and  strong.    Yet  he 


40         The  Backwash  of  War 

was  obliged  to  wait  upon  a  little  screaming 
man,  five  feet  two,  whose  nose  had  been  shot 
away,  exchanged  for  the  Medaille  Militaire 
upon  his  breast,  who  screamed  out  to  him: 
"Bring  me  the  basin,  embusquel"  And  he 
had  brought  it.  If  he  had  not  brought  it, 
the  little  screaming  man  with  no  nose  and 
the  flat  bandage  across  his  face  would  have 
reported  him  to  the  Medecin  Chef,  and  in 
time  he  might  have  been  transferred  to  the 
front  line  trenches.  Anything  is  better 
than  the  front  line  trenches.  Fouquet  knew 
this,  because  the  wounded  men  were  so  bitter 
at  his  not  being  there.  The  old  men  were 
very  bitter.  At  the  end  of  the  summer, 
they  changed  the  troops  in  this  sector,  and 
the  young  Zouaves  were  replaced  by  old 
men  of  forty  and  forty-five.  They  looked 
very  much  older  than  this  when  they  were 
wounded  and  brought  into  the  hospital, 
for  their  hair  and  beards  were  often  quite 
white,  and  besides  their  wounds,  they  were 


The  Hole  in  the  Hedge        41 

often  sick  from  exposure  to  the  cold,  winter 
rains  of  Flanders.  One  of  these  old  men, 
who  were  nearly  always  querulous,  had  a 
son  also  serving  in  the  trenches.  He  was 
very  rude  to  Fouquet,  this  old  man.  Old 
and  young,  they  called  him  embusque.  Which 
meant  that  they  were  jealous  of  him,  that 
they  very  much  envied  him  for  escaping  the 
trenches,  and  considered  it  very  unjust  that 
they  knew  no  one  with  influence  who  could 
have  protected  them  in  the  same  way.  But 
Fouquet  was  very  sick  of  it  all.  Day  in  and 
day  out,  for  eighteen  months,  or  since  the 
beginning  of  the  war,  he  had  waited  upon 
the  wounded.  He  had  done  as  the  common- 
est soldier  had  ordered  him,  clodding  up  and 
down  the  ward  in  his  heavy  wooden  sabots, 
knocking  them  against  the  beds,  eliciting 
curses  for  his  intentional  clumsiness.  There 
were  also  many  priests  in  that  hospital,  like- 
wise serving  as  infirmiers.  They  too,  fetched 
and  carried,  but  they  did  not  seem  to  resent 


42         The  Backwash  of  War 

it.  Only  Fouquet  and  some  others  resented 
it.  Fouquet  resented  the  war,  and  the  first 
line  trenches,  and  the  field  hospital,  and  the 
wounded  men,  and  everything  connected 
with  the  war.  He  was  utterly  bored  with 
the  war.  The  hole  in  the  hedge  and  the 
estaminet  beyond  was  all  that  saved  him. 

There  was  a  priest  with  a  yellow  beard, 
who  also  used  the  hole  in  the  hedge.  He 
used  it  almost  every  night,  when  it  was  open. 
He  slipped  out,  got  his  drink,  and  then  slipped 
down  to  the  village  to  spend  the  night  with 
a  girl.  Only  he  was  crafty,  and  slipped  back 
again  through  the  hole  before  daylight,  and 
was  always  on  duty  again  in  the  morning. 
True,  he  was  very  cross  and  irritable,  and 
the  patients  did  without  things  rather  than 
ask  him  for  them,  and  sometimes  they 
suffered  a  great  deal,  doing  without  things, 
on  these  mornings  when  he  was  so  cross. 

But  with  Fouquet,  it  was  different.  He 
walked  in  boldly  through  the  gates  in  the 


The  Hole  in  the  Hedge        43 

morning,  and  said  that  he  had  been  out  all 
night  without  leave,  and  that  he  was  bored 
to  the  point  of  death.  So  the  MSdecin  Chef 
punished  him.  He  imprisoned  him,  and  as 
there  was  no  prison,  he  served  his  six  days' 
sentence  in  the  open  air.  He  donned  his 
eighty  pounds  of  marching  kit,  and  tramped 
up  and  down  the  plank  walks,  and  round 
behind  the  baracques,  in  the  mud,  in  full 
sight  of  all,  so  that  all  might  witness  his 
humiliation.  He  did  not  go  on  duty  again 
in  the  ward,  and  in  consequence,  the  ward 
suffered  through  lack  of  his  grudging,  un- 
couth administration. 

Sometimes  he  met  the  Directrice  as  he 
trudged  up  and  down.  He  was  always  afraid 
to  meet  her,  because  once  she  had  gone  to 
the  Medecin  Chef  and  had  him  pardoned. 
Her  gentle  heart  had  been  touched  at  the 
sight  of  his  public  disgrace,  so  she  had  had 
his  sentence  remitted,  and  he  had  been 
obliged  to  go  back  to  the  ward,  to  the  work  he 


44         The  Backwash  of  War 

loathed,  to  the  patients  he  despised,  after 
only  two  hours'  freedom  in  a  rare  October  sun. 
Since  then,  he  had  carefully  avoided  the 
Directrice  when  he  saw  her  blue  cloak  in  the 
distance,  coming  down  the  trottoir.  Women 
were  a  nuisance  at  the  Front. 

He  frequently  encountered  the  man  who 
picked  up  papers,  and  frankly  envied  him, 
for  this  man  had  a  very  easy  post.  He  was 
mobilized  as  a  member  of  the  formation  of 

Hospital  Number ,  and  his  work  consisted 

in  picking  up  scraps  of  paper  scattered  about 
the  groimds  within  the  enclosure.  He  had  a 
long  stick  with  a  nail  in  the  end,  and  a  small 
basket  because  there  wasn't  much  to  pick 
up.  With  the  nail,  he  picked  up  what  scraps 
there  were,  and  did  not  even  have  to  stoop 
over  to  do  it.  He  walked  about  in  the  clean, 
fresh  air,  and  when  it  rained,  he  cuddled  up 
against  the  stove  in  the  pharmacy.  The 
present  paper-gatherer  was  a  chemist;  his 
predecessor  had  been  a  priest.     It  was  a 


The  Hole  in  the  Hedge        45 

very  nice  position  for  an  able-bodied  man 
with  some  education,  and  Fouquet  greatly- 
desired  it  himself,  only  he  feared  he  was  not 
sufficiently  well  educated,  since  in  civil  life 
he  was  only  a  farm  hand.  So  in  his  march 
up  and  down  the  trottoir  he  cast  envious 
glances  at  the  man  who  picked  up  papers. 

So,  bearing  his  full-weight  marching  kit, 
he  walked  up  and  down,  between  the  ha- 
racques,  dogged  and  defiant.  The  other  or- 
derlies and  stretcher  bearers  laughed  at 
him,  and  said:  "There  goes  Fouquet,  pun- 
ished!" And  the  patients,  who  missed  him, 
asked:  "Where  is  Fouquet?  Pimished?" 
And  the  nurse  of  that  ward,  who  also  missed 
Fouquet,  said :  ' '  Poor  Fouquet !  Pimished !' ' 
But  Fouquet,  swaggering  up  and  down  in 
full  sight  of  all,  was  pleased  because  he  had 
had  a  good  drink  the  night  before,  and  did 
not  have  to  wait  upon  the  patients  the  day 
after,  and  to  him,  the  only  sane  thing  about 
the  war  was  the  discipline  of  the  Army. 


Alone 


47 


ALONE 

DOCHARD  died  to-day.  He  had  gas 
*■  ^  gangrene.  His  thigh,  from  knee  to  but- 
tock, was  torn  out  by  a  piece  of  German  shell. 
It  was  an  interesting  case,  because  the  infec- 
tion had  developed  so  quickly.  He  had  been 
placed  tmder  treatment  immediately  too, 
reaching  the  hospital  from  the  trenches 
about  six  hours  after  he  had  been  wounded. 
To  have  a  thigh  torn  off,  and  to  reach  first- 
class  surgical  care  within  six  hoiirs,  is  practi- 
cally immediately.  Still,  gas  gangrene  had 
developed,  which  showed  that  the  Germans 
were  using  very  poisonous  shells.  At  that 
field  hospital  there  had  been  established  a 
surgical  school,  to  which  young  men,  just 
graduated  from  medical  schools,  or  old  men, 
graduated  long  ago  from  medical  schools, 
4  49 


50         The  Backwash  of  War 

were  sent  to  leam  how  to  take  care  of  the 
wounded.  After  they  had  received  a  two 
months'  experience  in  this  sort  of  war  surgery, 
they  were  to  be  placed  in  other  hospitals, 
where  they  could  do  the  work  themselves. 
So  all  those  young  men  who  did  not  know 
much,  and  all  those  old  men  who  had  never 
known  much,  and  had  forgotten  most  of  that, 
were  up  here  at  this  field  hospital,  learning. 
This  had  to  be  done,  because  there  were  not 
enough  good  doctors  to  go  round,  so  in  order 
to  care  for  the  wotmded  at  all,  it  was  neces- 
sary to  furbish  up  the  immature  and  the 
senile.  However,  the  MSdecin  Chef  in  charge 
of  the  hospital  and  in  charge  of  the  surgical 
school,  was  a  brilliant  surgeon  and  a  good 
administrator,  so  he  taught  the  students  a 
good  deal.  Therefore,  when  Rochard  came 
into  the  operating  room,  all  the  young  stu- 
dents and  the  old  students  crowded  round 
to  see  the  case.  It  was  all  torn  away,  the 
flesh  from  that  right  thigh,  from  knee  to 


Alone  51 

buttock,  down  to  the  bone,  and  the  stench 
was  awful.  The  various  students  came  for- 
ward and  timidly  pressed  the  upper  part  of 
the  thigh,  the  remaining  part,  all  that  re- 
mained of  it,  with  their  fingers,  and  little 
crackling  noises  came  forth,  like  bubbles. 
Gas  gangrene.  Very  easy  to  diagnose.  Also 
the  bacteriologist  from  another  hospital  in 
the  region  happened  to  be  present,  and  he 
made  a  culture  of  the  material  discharged 
from  that  wound,  and  afterwards  told  the 
Medecm  Chef  that  it  was  positively  and 
absolutely  gas  gangrene.  But  the  Medecin 
Chef  had  already  taught  the  students 
that  gas  gangrene  may  be  recognized  by 
the  crackling  and  the  smell,  and  the  fact 
that  the  patient,  as  a  rule,  dies  pretty 
soon. 

They  could  not  operate  on  Rochard  and 
amputate  his  leg,  as  they  wanted  to  do. 
The  infection  was  so  high,  into  the  hip,  it 
could  not  be  done.     Moreover,  Rochard  had 


52         The  Backwash  of  War 

a  fractured  skull  as  well.  Another  piece  of 
shell  had  pierced  his  ear,  and  broken  into 
his  brain,  and  lodged  there.  Either  wound 
would  have  been  fatal,  but  it  was  the  gas 
gangrene  in  his  torn-out  thigh  that  would 
kill  him  first.  The  wound  stank.  It  was 
foul.  The  Medecin  Chef  took  a  curette,  a 
little  scoop,  and  scooped  away  the  dead  flesh, 
the  dead  muscles,  the  dead  nerves,  the  dead 
blood-vessels.  And  so  many  blood-vessels 
being  dead,  being  scooped  away  by  that 
sharp  curette,  how  could  the  blood  circulate 
in  the  top  half  of  that  flaccid  thigh?  It 
couldn't.  Afterwards,  into  the  deep,  yawn- 
ing wound,  they  put  many  compresses  of 
gauze,  soaked  in  carbolic  acid,  which  acid 
burned  deep  into  the  germs  of  the  gas  gan- 
grene, and  killed  them,  and  killed  much 
good  tissue  besides.  Then  they  covered  the 
burning,  smoking  gauze  with  absorbent  cot- 
ton, then  with  clean,  neat  bandages,  after 
which  they  called  the  stretcher  bearers,  and 


Alone  53 

Rochard  was  carried  from  the  operating 
table  back  to  the  ward. 

The  night  nurse  reported  next  morning 
that  he  had  passed  a  night  of  agony. 

'^Cela  pique!  Cela  brulef*'  he  cried  all 
night,  and  turned  from  side  to  side  to  find 
reUef.  Sometimes  he  lay  on  his  good  side; 
sometimes  he  lay  on  his  bad  side,  and  the 
night  nurse  turned  him  from  side  to  side, 
according  to  his  fancy,  because  she  knew  that 
on  neither  one  side  nor  the  other  would  he 
find  relief,  except  such  mental  relief  as  he 
got  by  turning.  She  sent  one  of  the  order- 
lies, Fouquet,  for  the  Medecin  Chef,  and  the 
Midecin  Chef  came  to  the  ward,  and  looked 
at  Rochard,  and  ordered  the  night  nurse  to 
give  him  morphia,  and  again  morphia,  as 
often  as  she  thought  best.  For  only  death 
could  bring  relief  from  such  pain  as  that, 
and  only  morphia,  a  little  in  advance  of 
death,  could  bring  partial  relief. 

So  the  night  nurse  took  care  of  Rochard 


54         The  Backwash  of  War 

all  that  night,  and  turned  him  and  turned 
him,  from  one  side  to  the  other,  and  gave  him 
morphia,  as  the  Medecin  Chef  had  ordered. 
She  listened  to  his  cries  all  night,  for  the 
morphia  brought  him  no  relief.  Morphia 
gives  a  little  relief,  at  times,  from  the  pain 
of  life,  but  it  is  only  death  that  brings 
absolute  relief. 

When  the  day  nurse  came  on  duty  next 
morning,  there  was  Rochard  in  agony. 
*'Cela  pique!  Cela  brulel"  he  cried.  And 
again  and  again,  all  the  time,  "  Cela  piquel 
Cela  brulel*',  meaning  the  pain  in  his  leg. 
And  because  of  the  piece  of  shell,  which  had 
penetrated  his  ear  and  lodged  in  his  brain 
somewhere,  his  wits  were  wandering.  No 
one  can  be  fully  conscious  with  an  inch  of 
German  shell  in  his  skull.  And  there  was  a 
full  inch  of  German  shell  in  Rochard's  skull, 
in  his  brain  somewhere,  for  the  radiographist 
said  so.  He  was  a  wonderful  radiographist 
and  anatomist,  and  he  worked  accurately 


Alone  55 

with  a  beautiful,  expensive  machine,  given 
him,  or  given  the  field  hospital,  by  Madame 
Ciuie. 

So  all  night  Rochard  screamed  in  agony, 
and  turned  and  twisted,  first  on  the  hip  that 
was  there,  and  then  on  the  hip  that  was  gone, 
and  on  neither  side,  even  with  many  ampoules 
of  morphia,  could  he  find  relief.  Which 
shows  that  morphia,  good  as  it  is,  is  not  as 
good  as  death.  So  when  the  day  ntuse  came 
on  in  the  morning,  there  was  Rochard  strong 
after  a  night  of  agony,  strong  after  many 
picqures  of  strychnia,  which  kept  his  heart 
beating  and  his  limgs  breathing,  strong 
after  many  picqures  of  morphia  which  did 
not  relieve  his  pain.  Thus  the  science  of 
heaHng  stood  baffled  before  the  science  of 
destroying. 

Rochard  died  slowly.  He  stopped  strug- 
gling. He  gave  up  trying  to  find  relief  by 
lying  upon  the  hip  that  was  there,  or  the  hip 
that    was   gone.     He   ceased    to   cry.     His 


56         The  Backwash  of  War 

brain,  in  which  was  lodged  a  piece  of  German 
shell,  seemed  to  reason,  to  become  reasonable, 
with  break  of  day.  The  evening  before, 
after  his  return  from  the  operating  room,  he 
had  been  decorated  with  the  Medaille  Mill- 
taire,  conferred  upon  him,  in  extremis,  by 
the  General  of  the  region.  Upon  one  side 
of  the  medal,  which  was  pinned  to  the  wall 
at  the  head  of  the  bed,  were  the  words: 
Valeur  et  Discipline.  Discipline  had  tri- 
umphed. He  was  very  good  and  quiet  now, 
very  obedient  and  disciplined,  and  no  longer 
disturbed  the  ward  with  his  moanings. 

Little  Rochard!  Little  man,  gardener 
by  trade,  aged  thirty-nine,  widower,  with 
one  child!  The  piece  of  shell  in  his  skull 
had  made  one  eye  blind.  There  had  been 
a  haemorrhage  into  the  eyeball,  which  was  all 
red  and  sunken,  and  the  eyelid  would  not 
close  over  it,  so  the  red  eye  stared  and  stared 
into  space.  And  the  other  eye  drooped  and 
drooped,   and  the  white  showed,   and   the 


Alone  57 

eyelid  drooped  till  nothing  but  the  white 
showed,  and  that  showed  that  he  was  dying. 
But  the  blind,  red  eye  stared  beyond.  It 
stared  fixedly,  unwinkingly,  into  space.  So 
always  the  niu-se  watched  the  dull,  white  eye, 
which  showed  the  approach  of  death. 

No  one  in  the  ward  was  fond  of  Rochard. 
He  had  been,  there  only  a  few  hours.  He 
meant  nothing  to  any  one  there.  He  was  a 
dying  man,  in  a  field  hospital,  that  was  all. 
Little  stranger  Rochard,  with  one  blind, 
red  eye  that  stared  into  Hell,  the  Hell  he 
had  come  from.  And  one  white,  dying  eye, 
that  showed  his  hold  on  life,  his  brief,  short 
hold.  The  nurse  cared  for  him  very  gently, 
very  conscientiously,  very  skilfully.  The 
surgeon  came  many  times  to  look  at  him, 
but  he  had  done  for  him  all  that  could  be 
done,  so  each  time  he  turned  away  with  a 
shrug.  Fouquet,  the  young  orderly,  stood 
at  the  foot  of  the  bed,  his  feet  far  apart,  his 
hands  on  his  hips,  and  regarded  Rochard, 


SS         The  Backwash  of  War 

and  said:  "Ah!  La  la!  La  la/'*  And 
Simon,  the  other  orderly,  also  stood  at  the 
foot  of  the  bed,  from  time  to  time,  and 
regarded  Rochard,  and  said:  "Ah/  Cest 
triste/     Cest  bien  triste/** 

So  Rochard  died,  a  stranger  among  stran- 
gers. And  there  were  many  people  there  to 
wait  upon  him,  but  there  was  no  one  there 
to  love  him.  There  was  no  one  there  to  see 
beyond  the  horror  of  the  red,  blind  eye,  of 
the  dull,  white  eye,  of  the  vile,  gangrene 
smell.  And  it  seemed  as  if  the  red,  staring 
eye  was  looking  for  something  the  hospital 
could  not  give.  And  it  seemed  as  if  the 
white,  glazed  eye  was  indifferent  to  every- 
thing the  hospital  could  give.  And  all  about 
him  was  the  vile  gangrene  smell,  which  made 
an  aura  about  him,  and  shut  him  into  him- 
self, very  completely.  And  there  was  nobody 
to  love  him,  to  forget  about  that  smell. 

He  sank  into  a  stupor  about  ten  o'clock 
in  the  morning,  and  was  unconscious  from 


Alone  59 

then  till  the  time  the  nurse  went  to  lunch. 
She  went  to  lunch  reluctantly,  but  it  is  neces- 
sary to  eat.  She  instructed  Fouquet,  the 
orderly,  to  watch  Rochard  carefully,  and  to 
call  her  if  there  was  any  change. 

After  a  short  time  she. came  back  from 
lunch,  and  hurried  to  see  Rochard,  hurried 
behind  the  flamboyant,  red,  cheerful  screens 
that  shut  him  off  from  the  rest  of  the  ward. 
Rochard  was  dead. 

At  the  other  end  of  the  ward  sat  the  two 
orderlies,  drinking  wine. 

Paris, 
April  15,  1915. 


A  Belgian  Civilian 


61 


A  BELGIAN  CIVILIAN 

A  BIG  English  ambulance  drove  along  the 
'**  high  road  from  Ypres,  going  in  the 
direction  of  a  French  field  hospital,  some  ten 
miles  from  Ypres.  Ordinarily,  it  could  have 
had  no  business  with  this  French  hospital, 
since  all  English  wounded  are  conveyed  back 
to  their  own  bases,  therefore  an  exceptional 
case  must  have  determined  its  route.  It  was 
an  exceptional  case — ^for  the  patient  lying 
quietly  within  its  yawning  body,  sheltered 
by  its  brown  canvas  wings,  was  not  an 
English  soldier,  but  only  a  small  Belgian 
boy,  a  civihan,  and  Belgian  civilians  belong 
neither  to  the  French  nor  English  services. 
It  is  true  that  there  was  a  hospital  for  Bel- 
gian civilians  at  the  English  base  at  Haze- 
brouck,  and  it  would  have  seemed  reasonable 
63 


64         The  Backwash  of  War 

to  have  taken  the  patient  there,  but  it  was 
more  reasonable  to  dump  him  at  this  French 
hospital,  which  was  nearer.  Not  from  any 
humanitarian  motives,  but  just  to  get  rid 
of  him  the  sooner.  In  war,  civilians  are 
cheap  things  at  best,  and  an  immature  civil- 
ian, Belgian  at  that,  is  very  cheap.  So  the 
heavy  English  ambulance  churned  its  way 
up  a  muddy  hill,  mashed  through  much  mud 
at  the  entrance  gates  of  the  hospital,  and 
crunched  to  a  halt  on  the  cinders  before  the 
Salle  d'Attente,  where  it  discharged  its  bur- 
den and  drove  off  again. 

The  surgeon  of  the  French  hospital  said: 
"What  have  we  to  do  with  this?"  yet  he 
regarded  the  patient  thoughtfully.  It  was 
a  very  small  patient.  Moreover,  the  big 
English  ambulance  had  driven  off  again,  so 
there  was  no  appeal.  The  small  patient 
had  been  deposited  upon  one  of  the  beds  in 
the  Salle  cTAttente,  and  the  French  surgeon 
looked  at  him  and  wondered  what  he  should 


A  Belgian  Civilian  65 

do.  The  patient,  now  that  he  was  here, 
belonged  as  much  to  the  French  field  hospital 
as  to  any  other,  and  as  the  big  English  am- 
bulance from  Ypres  had  driven  off  again, 
there  was  not  much  use  in  protesting.  The 
French  surgeon  was  annoyed  and  irritated. 
It  was  a  characteristic  English  trick,  he 
thought,  this  getting  other  people  to  do  their 
work.  Why  could  they  not  have  taken  the 
child  to  one  of  their  own  hospitals,  since  he 
had  been  wounded  in  their  lines,  or  else  have 
taken  him  to  the  hospital  provided  for  Bel- 
gian civilians,  where,  full  as  it  was,  there 
was  always  room  for  people  as  small  as 
this.  The  surgeon  worked  himself  up 
into  quite  a  temper.  There  is  one  thing 
about  members  of  the  Entente — they  un- 
derstand each  other.  The  French  surgeon's 
thoughts  travelled  round  and  round  in 
an  irritated  circle,  and  always  came  back 
to  the  fact  that  the  English  ambulance 
had   gone,   and   here   lay  the  patient,  and 


66         The  Backwash  of  War 

something    must    be    done.     So    he    stood 
considering. 

A  Belgian  civilian,  aged  ten.  Or  there- 
abouts. Shot  through  the  abdomen,  or  there- 
abouts. And  dying,  obviously.  As  usual, 
the  surgeon  pulled  and  twisted  the  long, 
black  hairs  on  his  hairy,  bare  arms,  while  he 
considered  what  he  should  do.  He  consid- 
ered for  five  minutes,  and  then  ordered  the 
child  to  the  operating  room,  and  scrubbed 
and  scrubbed  his  hands  and  his  hairy  arms, 
preparatory  to  a  major  operation.  For  the 
Belgian  civilian,  aged  ten,  had  been  shot 
through  the  abdomen  by  a  German  shell,  or 
piece  of  shell,  and  there  was  nothing  to  do 
but  try  to  remove  it.  It  was  a  hopeless  case, 
anyhow.  The  child  would  die  without  an 
operation,  or  he  would  die  during  the  opera- 
tion, or  he  would  die  after  the  operation. 
The  French  surgeon  scrubbed  his  hands  vi- 
ciously, for  he  was  still  greatly  incensed  over 
the  English  authorities  who  had  placed  the 


A  Belgian  Civilian  67 

case  in  his  hands  and  then  gone  away  again. 
They  should  have  taken  him  to  one  of  the 
EngHsh  bases,  St.  Omer,  or  Hazebrouck — 
it  was  an  imposition  to  have  dumped  him 
so  unceremoniously  here  simply  because 
"here"  was  so  many  kilometres  nearer. 
"Shirking,"  the  surgeon  called  it,  and  was 
much  incensed. 

After  a  most  searching  operation,  the  Bel- 
gian civilian  was  sent  over  to  the  ward,  to 
live  or  die  as  circumstances  determined. 
As  soon  as  he  came  out  of  ether,  he  began  to 
bawl  for  his  mother.  Being  ten  years  of  age, 
he  was  unreasonable,  and  bawled  for  her 
incessantly  and  could  not  be  pacified.  The 
patients  were  greatly  annoyed  by  this  dis- 
turbance, and  there  was  indignation  that  the 
welfare  and  comfort  of  useful  soldiers  should 
be  interfered  with  by  the  whims  of  a  futile 
and  useless  civilian,  a  Belgian  child  at  that. 
The  nurse  of  that  ward  also  made  a  fool  of 
herself  over  this  civilian,  giving  him  far  more 


68         The  Backwash  of  War 

attention  than  she  had  ever  bestowed  upon 
a  soldier.  She  was  sentimental,  and  his 
little  age  appealed  to  her — her  sense  of  pro- 
portion and  standard  of  values  were  all 
awrong.  The  Directrice  appeared  in  the 
ward  and  tried  to  comfort  the  civilian,  to 
still  his  howls,  and  then,  after  an  hour  of 
vain  effort,  she  decided  that  his  mother  must 
be  sent  for.  He  was  obviously  dying,  and 
it  was  necessary  to  send  for  his  mother, 
whom  alone  of  all  the  world  he  seemed  to 
need.  So  a  French  ambulance,  which  had 
nothing  to  do  with  Belgian  civilians,  nor  with 
Ypres,  was  sent  over  to  Ypres  late  in  the 
evening  to  fetch  this  mother  for  whom  the 
Belgian  civilian,  aged  ten,  bawled  so  persis- 
tently. 

She  arrived  finally,  and,  it  appeared,  re- 
luctantly. About  ten  o'clock  in  the  evening 
she  arrived,  and  the  moment  she  alighted 
from  the  big  ambulance  sent  to  fetch  her, 
she  began  complaining.     She  had  complained 


A  Belgian  Civilian  69 

all  the  way  over,  said  the  chauffeur.  She 
climbed  down  backward  from  the  front  seat, 
perched  for  a  moment  on  the  hub,  while  one 
heavy  leg,  with  foot  shod  in  slipping  sabot, 
groped  wildly  for  the  ground.  A  soldier 
with  a  lantern  watched  impassively,  watched 
her  solid  splash  into  a  mud  puddle  that  might 
have  been  avoided.  So  she  continued  her 
complaints.  She  had  been  dragged  away 
from  her  husband,  from  her  other  children, 
and  she  seemed  to  have  little  interest  in  her 
son,  the  Belgian  civilian,  said  to  be  dying. 
However,  now  that  she  was  here,  now  that 
she  had  come  all  this  way,  she  would  go  in 
to  see  him  for  a  moment,  since  the  Directrice 
seemed  to  think  it  so  important.  The  Di- 
rectrice of  this  French  field  hospital  was  an 
American,  by  marriage  a  British  subject, 
and  she  had  curious,  antiquated  ideas.  She 
seemed  to  feel  that  a  mother's  place  was  with 
her  child,  if  that  child  was  dying.  The 
Directrice  had  three  children  of  her  own  whom 


70         The  Backwash  of  War 

she  had  left  in  England  over  a  year  ago,  when 
she  came  out  to  Flanders  for  the  life  and 
adventures  of  the  Front.  But  she  would 
have  returned  to  England  immediately, 
without  an  instant's  hesitation,  had  she  re- 
ceived word  that  one  of  these  children  was 
dying.  Which  was  a  point  of  view  opposed 
to  that  of  this  Belgian  mother,  who  seemed 
to  feel  that  her  place  was  back  in  Ypres,  in 
her  home,  with  her  husband  and  other  child- 
ren. In  fact,  this  Belgian  mother  had  been 
rudely  dragged  away  from  her  home,  from 
her  family,  from  certain  duties  that  she 
seemed  to  think  important.  So  she  com- 
plained bitterly,  and  went  into  the  ward  most 
reluctantly,  to  see  her  son,  said  to  be  dying. 
She  saw  her  son,  and  kissed  him,  and  then 
asked  to  be  sent  back  to  Ypres.  The  Direc- 
trice  explained  that  the  child  would  not  live 
through  the  night.  The  Belgian  mother 
accepted  this  statement,  but  again  asked  to 
be  sent  back  to  Ypres.     The  Directrice  again 


A  Belgian  Civilian  71 

assured  the  Belgian  mother  that  her  son 
would  not  live  through  the  night,  and  asked 
her  to  spend  the  night  with  him  in  the  ward, 
to  assist  at  his  passing.  The  Belgian  woman 
protested. 

"If  Madame  la  Directrice  commands,  if 
she  insists,  then  I  must  assiiredly  obey.  I 
have  come  all  this  distance  because  she  com- 
manded me,  and  if  she  insists  that  I  spend 
the  night  at  this  place,  then  I  must  do  so. 
Only  if  she  does  not  insist,  then  I  prefer  to 
return  to  my  home,  to  my  other  children 
at  Ypres." 

However,  the  Directrice,  who  had  a  strong 
sense  of  a  mother's  duty  to  the  dying,  com- 
manded and  insisted,  and  the  Belgian  woman 
gave  way.  She  sat  by  her  son  all  night, 
listening  to  his  ravings  and  bawlings,  and 
was  with  him  when  he  died,  at  three  o'clock 
in  the  morning.  After  which  time,  she  re- 
quested to  be  taken  back  to  Ypres.  She 
was  moved  by  the  death  of  her  son,  but  her 


72         The  Backwash  of  War 

duty  lay  at  home.  Madame  la  Directrice 
had  promised  to  have  a  mass  said  at  the 
burial  of  the  child,  which  promise  having 
been  given,  the  woman  saw  no  necessity  for 
remaining. 

"My  husband,"  she  explained,  "has  a 
little  estaminet,  just  outside  of  Ypres.  We 
have  been  very  fortimate.  Only  yesterday, 
of  all  the  long  days  of  the  war,  of  the  many 
days  of  bombardment,  did  a  shell  fall  into 
our  kitchen,  wounding  our  son,  as  you  have 
seen.  But  we  have  other  children  to  con- 
sider, to  provide  for.  And  my  husband  is 
making  much  money  at  present,  selling  drink 
to  the  English  soldiers.  I  must  return  to 
assist  him." 

So  the  Belgian  civilian  was  buried  in  the 
cemetery  of  the  French  soldiers,  but  many 
hoiu-s  before  this  took  place,  the  mother  of 
the  civilian  had  departed  for  Ypres.  The 
chauffeur  of  the  ambulance  which  was  to 
convey  her  back  to  Ypres  turned  very  white 


A  Belgian  Civilian  73 

when  given  his  orders.  Everyone  dreaded 
Ypres,  and  the  dangers  of  Ypres.  It  was 
the  place,  of  death.  Only  the  Belgian  woman, 
whose  husband  kept  an  estaminet,  and  made 
much  money  selling  drink  to  the  English 
soldiers,  did  not  dread  it.  She  and  her  hus- 
band were  making  much  money  out  of  the 
war,  money  which  would  give  their  children 
a  start  in  life.  When  the  ambulance  was 
ready  she  climbed  into  it  with  alacrity,  al- 
though with  a  feeling  of  gratitude  because 
the  Directrice  had  promised  a  mass  for  her 
dead  child. 

"These  Belgians!"  said  a  French  soldier. 
*'  How  prosperous  they  will  be  after  the  war ! 
How  much  money  they  will  make  from  the 
Americans,  and  from  the  others  who  come 
to  see  the  ruins ! " 

And  as  an  afterthought,  in  an  undertone, 
he  added:  '' Ces  sales  Beiges!'' 


The  Interval 


75 


THE  INTERVAL 

A  S  an  orderly,  Erard  wasn't  much  good. 
**  He  never  waited  upon  the  patients 
if  he  could  help  it,  and  when  he  couldn't 
help  it,  he  was  so  disagreeable  that  they 
wished  they  had  not  asked  him  for  things. 
The  newcomers,  who  had  been  in  the  hospital 
only  a  few  days,  used  to  think  he  was  deaf, 
since  he  failed  to  hear  their  requests,  and 
they  did  not  like  to  yell  at  him,  out  of  con- 
sideration for  their  comrades  in  the  adjoin- 
ing beds.  Nor  was  he  a  success  at  sweeping 
the  ward,  since  he  did  it  with  the  broom  in 
one  hand  and  a  copy  of  the  Petit  Parisien 
in  the  other — in  fact,  when  he  sat  down  on  a 
bed  away  at  the  end  and  frankly  gave  himself 
up  to  a  two-year-old  copy  of  Le  Rire,  sent 
out  with  a  lot  of  old  magazines  for  the  patients, 
77 


78         The  Backwash  of  War 

he  was  no  less  effective  than  when  he  sulkily 
worked.  There  was  just  one  thing  he  liked 
and  did  well,  and  that  was  to  watch  for  the 
Generals.  He  was  an  expert  in  recognizing 
them  when  they  were  as  yet  a  long  way  off. 
He  used  to  slouch  against  the  window  panes 
and  keep  a  keen  eye  upon  the  trottoir  on  such 
days  or  at  such  hours  as  the  Generals  were 
likely  to  appear.  Upon  catching  sight  of 
the  oak-leaves  in  the  distance,  he  would  at 
once  notify  the  ward,  so  that  the  orderlies 
and  the  nurse  could  tidy  up  things  before  the 
General  made  roimds.  He  had  a  very  keen 
eye  for  oak-leaves — the  golden  oak -leaves 
on  the  General's  kepi — and  he  never  by  any 
chance  gave  a  false  alarm  or  mistook  a  colonel 
in  the  distance,  and  so  put  us  to  tidying  up 
unnecessarily.  He  did  not  help  with  the 
work  of  course,  but  continued  leaning  against 
the  window,  reporting  the  General's  progress 
up  the  trottoir — that  he  had  now  gone  into 
Salle  HI.— that  he  had  left  Salle  III.  and 


The  Interval  79 

was  conversing  outside  Salle  II. — that  he 
was  now,  positively,  on  his  way  up  the  incline 
leading  into  Salle  I.,  and  would  be  upon  us 
any  minute.  Sometimes  the  General  lin- 
gered unnecessarily  long  on  the  incline,  the 
wooden  slope  leading  up  to  the  ward,  in 
which  case  he  was  not  visible  from  the  win- 
dow, and  Erard  would  amuse  us  by  regret- 
ting that  he  had  no  periscope  for  the  transom 
over  the  door. 

There  were  two  Generals  who  visited  the 
hospital.  The  big  General,  the  important 
one,  the  Commander  of  the  region,  who  was 
always  beautiful  to  look  upon  in  his  tight, 
well-fitting  black  jacket,  trimmed  with  astra- 
khan, who  came  from  his  limousine  with  a 
Normandy  stick  dangling  from  his  wrist, 
and  who  wore  spotless,  clean  gloves.  This, 
the  big  General,  came  to  decorate  the  men 
who  were  entitled  to  the  Croix  de  Guerre  and 
the  Medaille  Militaire,  and  after  he  had  de- 
corated one  or  two,  as  the  case  might  be,  he 


8o         The  Backwash  of  War 

usually  continued  on  through  the  hospital, 
shaking  hands  here  and  there  with  the  pa- 
tients, and  chatting  with  the  Directrice  and 
with  the  doctors  and  officers  who  followed  in 
his  wake.  The  other  General  was  not  nearly 
so  imposing.  He  was  short  and  fat  and 
dressed  in  a  grey-blue  uniform,  of  the  shade 
known  as  invisible,  and  his  Mpi  was  hidden 
by  a  grey-blue  cover,  with  a  little  square  hole 
cut  out  in  front,  so  that  an  inch  of  oak-leaves 
might  be  seen.  He  was  much  more  formid- 
able than  the  big  General,  however,  since  he 
was  the  Medecin  Inspecteur  of  the  region,  and 
was  responsible  for  all  the  hospitals  there- 
abouts. He  made  rather  extensive  rounds, 
closely  questioning  the  surgeons  as  to  the 
wounds  and  treatment  of  each  man,  and  as 
he  was  a  doctor  as  well,  he  knew  how  to 
judge  of  the  replies.  Whereas  the  big  Gen- 
eral was  a  soldier  and  not  a  doctor,  and  was 
thus  unable  to  ask  any  disconcerting  ques- 
tions, so  that  his  visits,  while  tedious,  were 


The  Interval  8i 

never  embarrassing.  When  a  General  came 
on  the  place,  it  was  a  signal  to  down  tools. 
The  surgeons  would  hurriedly  finish  their 
operations,  or  postpone  them  if  possible, 
and  the  dressings  in  the  wards  were  also 
stopped  or  postponed,  while  the  surgeons 
would  hurry  after  the  General,  whichever 
one  it  was,  and  make  deferential  rounds 
with  him,  if  it  took  all  day.  And  as  it  usu- 
ally took  at  least  two  hours,  the  visits  of  the 
Generals,  one  or  both,  meant  considerable 
interruption  to  the  hospital  routine.  Some- 
times, by  chance,  both  Generals  arrived  at 
the  same  time,  which  meant  that  there  were 
double  rounds,  beginning  at  opposite  ends 
of  the  enclosure,  and  the  surgeons  were  in 
a  quandary  as  to  whose  suite  they  should 
attach  themselves.  And  the  days  when  it  was 
busiest,  when  the  work  was  hardest,  when 
there  was  more  work  than  double  the  staff 
could  accomplish  in  twenty-four  hours,  were 
the  days  that  the  Generals  usually  appeared. 


82         The  Backwash  of  War 

There  are  some  days  when  it  is  very  bad  in 
a  field  hospital,  just  as  there  are  some  days 
when  there  is  nothing  to  do,  and  the  whole 
staff  is  practically  idle.  The  bad  days  are 
those  when  the  endless  roar  of  the  guns  makes 
the  little  wooden  baracgues  rock  and  rattle, 
and  when  endless  processions  of  ambulances 
drive  in  and  deliver  broken,  ruined  men,  and 
then  drive  off  again,  to  return  loaded  with 
more  wrecks.  The  beds  in  the  Salle  d'At- 
tente,  where  the  ambulances  unload,  are 
filled  with  heaps  under  blankets.  Coarse, 
hobnailed  boots  stick  out  from  the  blankets, 
and  sometimes  the  heaps,  which  are  men, 
moan  or  are  silent.  On  the  floor  lie  piles 
of  clothing,  filthy,  muddy,  blood-soaked,  torn 
or  cut  from  the  silent  bodies  on  the  beds. 
The  stretcher  bearers  step  over  these  piles 
of  dirty  clothing,  or  kick  them  aside,  as  they 
lift  the  shrinking  bodies  to  the  brown  stretch- 
ers, and  carry  them  across,  one  by  one,  to 
the  operating  room.     The  operating  room 


The  Interval  83 

is  filled  with  stretchers,  lying  in  rows  upon 
the  floor,  waiting  their  turn  to  be  emptied, 
to  have  their  burdens  lifted  from  them  to 
the  high  operating  tables.  And  as  fast  as 
the  stretchers  are  emptied,  the  stretcher- 
bearers  hurry  back  to  the  Salle  d'Attentet 
where  the  ambulances  dump  their  loads,  and 
come  over  to  the  operating  room  again,  with 
fresh  lots.  Three  tables  going  in  the  operat- 
ing room,  and  the  white-gowned  surgeons 
stand  so  thick  around  the  tables  that  you 
cannot  see  what  is  on  them.  There  are 
stretchers  lying  on  the  floor  of  the  corridor, 
and  against  the  walls  of  the  operating  room, 
and  more  ambulances  are  driving  in  all  the 
time. 

From  the  operating  room  they  are  brought 
into  the  wards,  these  bandaged  heaps  from 
the  operating  tables,  these  heaps  that  once 
were  men.  The  clean  beds  of  the  ward  are 
turned  back  to  receive  them,  to  receive  the 
motionless,  bandaged  heaps  that  are  lifted, 


84         The  Backwash  of  War 

shoved,  or  rolled  from  the  stretchers  to  the 
beds.  Again  and  again,  all  day  long,  the 
procession  of  stretchers  comes  into  the  wards. 
The  foremost  bearer  kicks  open  the  door  with 
his  knee,  and  lets  in  ahead  of  him  a  blast  of 
winter  rain,  which  sets  dancing  the  charts 
and  papers  lying  on  the  table,  and  blows  out 
the  alcohol  lamp  over  which  the  syringe  is 
boiling.  Someone  bangs  the  door  shut.  The 
unconscious  form  is  loaded  on  the  bed.  He 
is  heavy  and  the  bed  sags  beneath  his  weight. 
The  hrancardiers  gather  up  their  red  blan- 
kets and  shuflfle  off  again,  leaving  cakes  of 
mud  and  streaks  of  muddy  water  on  the 
green  Hnoleum.  Outside  the  gims  roar  and 
inside  the  haracques  shake,  and  again  and 
again  the  stretcher  bearers  come  into  the 
ward,  carrying  dying  men  from  the  high  tables 
in  the  operating  room.  They  are  all  that 
stand  between  us  and  the  guns,  these  wrecks 
upon  the  beds.  Others  like  them  are  stand- 
ing between  us  and  the  guns,  others  like 


The  Interval  85 

them,  who  will  reach  us  before  morning. 
Wrecks  like  these.  They  are  old  men,  most 
of  them.     The  old  troops,  grey  and  bearded. 

There  is  an  attack  going  on.  That  does 
not  mean  that  the  Germans  are  advancing. 
It  just  means  that  the  ambulances  are  busy, 
for  these  old  troops,  these  old  wrecks  upon 
the  beds,  are  holding  up  the  Germans. 
Otherwise,  we  should  be  swept  out  of  exist- 
ence. Our  hospital,  ourselves,  would  be 
swept  out  of  existence,  were  it  not  for  these 
old  wrecks  upon  the  beds.  These  filthy, 
bearded,  dying  men  upon  the  beds,  who  are 
holding  back  the  Germans.  More  like  them, 
in  the  trenches,  are  holding  back  the  Ger- 
mans. By  tomorrow  these  others,  too,  will 
be  with  us,  bleeding,  dying.  But  there  will 
be  others  like  them  in  the  trenches,  to  held 
back  the  Germans. 

This  is  the  day  of  an  attack.  Yesterday 
was  the  day  of  an  attack.  The  day  before 
was  the  day  of  an  attack.     The  guns  are 


86         The  Backwash  of  War 

raising  Hell,  seven  kilometres  beyond  us, 
and  our  haracques  shake  and  tremble  with 
their  thunder.  These  men,  grey  and  bearded, 
dying  in  oiu"  clean  beds,  wetting  our  clean 
sheets  with  the  blood  that  oozes  from  their 
dressings,  have  been  out  there,  moaning  in 
the  trenches.  When  they  die,  we  will  pull 
off  the  bloody  sheets,  and  replace  them  with 
fresh,  clean  ones,  and  turn  them  back  neatly, 
waiting  for  the  next  agonizing  man.  We  have 
many  beds,  and  many  fresh,  clean  sheets, 
and  so  we  are  always  ready  for  these  old, 
hairy  men,  who  are  standing  between  us  and 
the  Germans. 

They  seem  very  weak  and  frail  and  thin. 
How  can  they  do  it,  these  old  men?  Last 
summer  the  young  boys  did  it.  Now  it  is 
the  turn  of  these  old  men. 

There  are  three  dying  in  the  ward  today. 
It  will  be  better  when  they  die.  The  Ger- 
man shells  have  made  them  ludicrous,  re- 
pulsive.    We  see  them  in  this  awful  interval. 


The  Interval  87 

between  life  and  death.  This  interval  when 
they  are  gross,  absurd,  fantastic.  Life  is 
clean  and  death  is  clean,  but  this  interval 
between  the  two  is  gross,  absurd,  fantastic. 

Over  there,  down  at  the  end,  is  Rollin. 
He  came  in  three  days  ago.  A  piece  of  shell 
penetrated  his  right  eyelid,  a  little  wound 
so  small  that  it  was  not  worth  a  dressing. 
Yet  that  little  piece  of  obus  lodged  somewhere 
inside  his  skull,  above  his  left  ear,  so  the 
radiographist  says,  and  he's  paralyzed.  Par- 
alyzed all  down  the  other  side,  and  one  supine 
hand  flops  about,  and  one  supine  leg  flops 
about,  in  jerks.  One  bleary  eye  stays  open, 
and  the  other  eyelid  stays  shut,  over  the 
other  bleary  eye.  Meningitis  has  set  in  and 
it  won't  be  long  now,  before  we'll  have  an- 
other empty  bed.  Yellow  foam  flows  down 
his  nose,  thick  yellow  foam,  bubbles  of  it, 
bursting,  bubbling  yellow  foam.  It  humps 
up  tmder  his  nose,  up  and  up,  in  bubbles, 
and  the  bubbles  burst  and  run  in  turgid 


88         The  Backwash  of  War 

streams  down  upon  his  shaggy  beard.  On 
the  wall,  above  his  bed,  hang  his  medals. 
They  are  hung  up,  high  up,  so  he  can  see 
them.  He  can't  see  them  today,  because 
now  he  is  unconscious,  but  yesterday  and 
the  day  before,  before  he  got  as  bad  as  this, 
he  could  see  them  and  it  made  him  cry.  He 
knew  he  had  been  decorated  in  extremis,  be- 
cause he  was  going  to  die,  and  he  did  not 
want  to  die.  So  he  sobbed  and  sobbed  all 
the  while  the  General  decorated  him,  and 
protested  that  he  did  not  want  to  die.  He'd 
saved  three  men  from  death,  earning  those 
medals,  and  at  the  time  he  never  thought 
of  death  himself.  Yet  in  the  ward  he  sobbed 
and  sobbed,  and  protested  that  he  did  not 
want  to  die. 

Back  of  those  red  screens  is  Henri.  He  is 
a  priest,  mobilized  as  infirmier.  A  good  one 
too,  and  very  tender  and  gentle  with  the 
patients.  He  comes  from  the  ward  next 
door,  Salle  II.,  and  is  giving  extreme  unction 


The  Interval  89 

to  the  man  in  that  bed,  back  of  the  red 
screens.  Peek  through  the  screens  and  you 
can  see  Henri,  in  his  shirt  sleeves,  with  a 
little,  crumpled,  purple  stole  around  his 
neck.  No,  the  patient  has  never  regained 
consciousness  since  he's  been  here,  but  Henri 
says  it's  all  right.  He  may  be  a  Catholic. 
Better  to  take  chances.  It  can't  hurt  him, 
anyway,  if  he  isn't.  I  am  glad  Henri  is 
back  of  those  red  screens.  A  few  minutes 
ago  he  came  down  the  ward,  in  search  of 
absorbent  cotton  for  the  Holy  Oils,  and  then 
he  got  so  interested  watching  the  doctors 
doing  dressings,  stayed  so  long  watching 
them,  that  I  thought  he  would  not  get  back 
again,  behind  the  screens,  in  time. 

See  that  man  in  the  bed  next?  He's  dying 
too.  They  trepanned  him  when  he  came. 
He  can't  speak,  but  we  got  his  name  and 
regiment  from  the  medal  on  his  wrist.  He 
wants  to  write.  Isn't  it  funny!  He  has  a 
block  of  paper  and  a  pencil,  and  all  day  long 


90         The  Backwash  of  War 

he  writes,  writes,  on  the  paper.  Always  and 
always,  over  and  over  again,  he  writes  on  the 
paper,  and  he  gives  the  paper  to  everyone  who 
passes.  He's  got  something  on  his  mind  that 
he  wants  to  get  across,  before  he  dies.  But  no 
one  can  understand  him.  No  one  can  read 
what  he  has  written — it  is  just  scrawls,  scrib- 
bles, unintelligible.  Day  and  night,  for  he 
never  sleeps,  he  writes  on  that  block  of  paper, 
and  tears  off  the  sheets  and  gives  them  to 
everyone  who  passes.  And  no  one  can  under- 
stand, for  it  is  just  illegible,  unintelligible 
scribbles.  Once  we  took  the  paper  away  to  see 
what  he  would  do  and  then  he  wrote  with  his 
finger  upon  the  wooden  frame  of  the  screen. 
The  same  thing,  scribbles,  but  they  made  no 
mark  on  the  screen,  and  he  seemed  so  dis- 
tressed because  they  made  no  mark  that 
we  gave  him  back  his  paper  again,  and  now 
he's  happy.  Or  I  suppose  he's  happy.  He 
seems  content  when  we  take  this  paper  and 
pretend  to  read  it.     He  seems  happy,  scrib- 


The  Interval  91 

bling  those  words  that  are  words  to  him  but 
not  to  us.  Careful!  Don't  stand  too  close! 
He  spits.  Yes,  all  the  time,  at  the  ^id  of 
every  line  he  spits.  Far  too.  Way  across 
the  ward.  Don't  you  see  that  his  bed  and 
the  bed  next  are  covered  with  rubber  sheets? 
That's  because  he  spits.  Big  spits,  too, 
far  across  the  ward.  And  always  he  writes, 
incessantly,  day  and  night.  He  writes  on 
that  block  of  paper  and  spits  way  across  the 
ward  at  the  end  of  every  line.  He's  got 
something  on  his  mind  that  he  wants  to  get 
across.  Do  you  think  he's  thinking  of  the 
Germans?  He's  dying  though.  He  can't 
spit  so  far  today  as  he  did  yesterday. 

Death  is  dignified  and  life  is  dignified,  but 
the  intervals  are  awful.  They  are  ludicrous, 
repulsive. 

Is  that  Erard,  calling?  Calling  that  the 
Generals  are  coming,  both  of  them,  together? 
Hurry!  Tidy  up  the  ward!  Rub  away  the 
froth  from  under  RoUin's  nose!      Pull  his 


92         The  Backwash  of  War 

sheets  straight!  Take  that  wet  towel,  and 
clean  the  mackintosh  upon  that  bed  and  the 
bed  adjoining.  See  if  Henri's  finished. 
Take  away  the  screens.  Pull  the  sheets 
straight.  Tidy  up  the  ward — tell  the  others 
not  to  budge !    The  Generals  are  coming ! 

Paris, 
9  May,  1916. 


Women  and  Wives 


93 


WOMEN  AND  WIVES 

A  BITTER  wind  swept  in  from  the  North 
'**  Sea.  It  swept  in  over  many  miles  of 
Flanders  plains,  driving  gusts  of  rain  before 
it.  It  was  a  biting  gale  by  the  time  it  reached 
the  little  cluster  of  wooden  huts  composing 
the  field  hospital,  and  rain  and  wind  together 
dashed  against  the  huts,  blew  under  them, 
blew  through  them,  crashed  to  pieces  a  swing- 
ing window  down  at  the  laundry,  and  loos- 
ened the  roof  of  Salle  I.  at  the  other  end  of 
the  enclosure.  It  was  just  ordinary  winter 
weather,  such  as  had  lasted  for  months  on 
end,  and  which  the  Belgians  spoke  of  as  vile 
weather,  while  the  French  called  it  vile 
Belgian  weather.  The  drenching  rain  soaked 
into  the  long,  green  winter  grass,  and  the 
sweeping  wind  was  bitter  cold,  and  the  howl- 
95 


96         The  Backwash  of  War 

ing  of  the  wind  was  louder  than  the  guns,  so 
that  it  was  only  when  the  wind  paused  for 
a  moment,  between  blasts,  that  the  rolling 
of  the  guns  could  be  heard. 

In  Salle  I.  the  stove  had  gone  out.  It  was 
a  good  little  stove,  but  somehow  was  un- 
equal to  struggling  with  the  wind  which  blew 
down  the  long,  rocking  stove  pipe,  and  blew 
the  fire  out.  So  the  little  stove  grew  cold, 
and  the  hot  water  jug  on  the  stove  grew  cold, 
and  all  the  patients  at  that  end  of  the  ward 
likewise  grew  cold,  and  demanded  hot  water 
bottles,  and  there  wasn't  any  hot  water  with 
which  to  fill  them.  So  the  patients  com- 
plained and  shivered,  and  in  the  pauses  of 
the  wind,  one  heard  the  guns. 

Then  the  roof  of  the  ward  lifted  about  an 
inch,  and  more  wind  beat  down,  and  as  it 
beat  down,  so  the  roof  lifted.  The  orderly 
remarked  that  if  this  Belgian  weather  contin- 
ued, by  tomorrow  the  roof  would  be  clean 
off — blown  off  into  the  German  lines.     So 


Women  and  Wives  97 

all  laughed  as  Fouquet  said  this,  and  wondered 
how  they  could  lie  abed  with  the  roof  of 
Salle  I.,  the  Salle  of  the  Grands  Blesses,  blown 
over  into  the  German  lines.  The  ward  did 
not  present  a  neat  appearance,  for  all  the 
beds  were  pushed  about  at  queer  angles,  in 
from  the  wall,  out  from  the  wall,  some 
touching  each  other,  some  very  far  apart, 
and  all  to  avoid  the  little  leaks  of  rain 
which  streamed  or  dropped  down  from 
little  holes  in  the  roof.  This  weary,  weary 
war!  These  long  days  of  boredom  in  the 
hospital,  these  days  of  incessant  wind  and 
rain  and  cold. 

Armand,  the  chief  orderly,  ordered  Fou- 
quet to  rebuild  the  fire,  and  Fouquet  slipped 
on  his  sabots  and  clogged  down  the  ward, 
away  outdoors  in  the  wind,  and  returned 
finally  with  a  box  of  coal  on  his  shoulders, 
which  he  dumped  heavily  on  the  floor.  He 
was  clumsy  and  sullen,  and  the  coal  was  wet 
and  mostly  slate,  and  the  patients  laughed 


98         The  Backwash  of  War 

at  his  efforts  to  rebuild  the  fire.  Finally, 
however,  it  was  alight  again,  and  radiated 
out  a  faint  warmth,  which  served  to  bring 
out  the  smell  of  iodoform,  and  of  draining 
wounds,  and  other  smells  which  loaded  the 
cold,  close  air.  Then,  no  one  knows  who 
began  it,  one  of  the  patients  showed  the  nurse 
a  photograph  of  his  wife  and  child,  and  in 
a  moment  every  man  in  the  twenty  beds  was 
fishing  back  of  his  bed,  in  his  musette,  under 
his  pillow,  for  photographs  of  his  wife.  They 
all  had  wives,  it  seems,  for  remember,  these 
were  the  old  troops,  who  had  replaced  the 
young  Zouaves  who  had  guarded  this  part 
of  the  Front  all  summer.  One  by  one  they 
came  out,  these  photographs,  from  weather- 
beaten  sacks,  from  shabby  boxes,  from  imder 
pillows,  and  the  nurse  must  see  them  all. 
Pathetic  little  pictures  they  were,  of  common, 
working-class  women,  some  fat  and  work- 
worn,  some  thin  and  work-worn,  some  with 
stodgy  little  children  grouped  about  them, 


Women  and  Wives  99 

some  without,  but  all  were  practically  the 
same.  They  were  the  wives  of  these  men 
in  the  beds  here,  the  working-class  wives  of 
working-class  men — the  soldiers  of  the 
trenches.  Ah  yes,  France  is  democratic. 
It  is  the  Nation's  war,  and  all  the  men  of  the 
Nation,  regardless  of  rank,  are  serving.  But 
some  serve  in  better  places  than  others. 
The  trenches  are  mostly  reserved  for  men  of 
the  working  class,  which  is  reasonable,  as 
there  are  more  of  them. 

The  rain  beat  down,  and  the  little  stove 
glowed,  and  the  afternoon  drew  to  a  close, 
and  the  photographs  of  the  wives  continued 
to  pass  from  hand  to  hand.  There  was  much 
talk  of  home,  and  much  of  it  was  longing, 
and  much  of  it  was  pathetic,  and  much  of  it 
was  resigned.  And  always  the  little,  ugly 
wives,  the  stupid,  ordinary  wives,  represented 
home.  And  the  words  home  and  wife  were 
interchangeable  and  stood  for  the  same 
thing.     And  the  glories  and  heroisms  of  war 


loo       The  Backwash  of  War 

seemed  of  less  interest,  as  a  factor  in  life, 
than  these  stupid  little  wives. 

Then  Armand,  the  chief  orderly,  showed 
them  all  the  photograph  of  his  wife.  No  one 
knew  that  he  was  married,  but  he  said  yes, 
and  that  he  received  a  letter  from  her  every 
day — sometimes  it  was  a  postcard.  Also 
that  he  wrote  to  her  every  day.  We  all 
knew  how  nervous  he  used  to  get,  about 
letter  time,  when  the  vaguemestre  made  his 
rounds,  every  morning,  distributing  letters 
to  all  the  wards.  We  all  knew  how  impa- 
tient he  used  to  get,  when  the  vaguemestre 
laid  his  letter  upon  the  table,  and  there  it 
lay,  on  the  table,  while  he  was  forced  to 
make  rounds  with  the  surgeon,  and  could 
not  claim  it  until  long  afterwards.  So  it 
was  from  his  wife,  that  daily  letter,  so  anx- 
iously, so  nervously  awaited ! 

Simon  had  a  wife  too.  Simon,  the  young 
surgeon,  German-looking  in  appearance,  six 
feet  of  blond  brute.     But  not  blond  brute 


Women  and  Wives  loi 

really.  Whatever  his  appearance,  there  was 
in  him  something  finer,  something  tenderer, 
something  nobler,  to  distingmsh  him  from 
the  brute.  About  three  times  a  week  he 
walked  into  the  ward  with  his  fountain  pen 
between  his  teeth — he  did  not  smoke,  but 
he  chewed  his  fountain  pen — and  when  the 
dressings  were  over,  he  would  tell  the  nurse, 
shyly,  accidentally,  as  it  were,  some  little 
news  about  his  home.  Some  little  incident 
concerning  his  wife,  some  affectionate  anec- 
dote about  his  three  young  children.  Once 
when  one  of  the  staff  went  over  to  London 
on  vacation,  Simon  asked  her  to  buy  for  his 
wife  a  leather  coat,  such  as  EngHsh  women 
wear,  for  motoring.  Always  he  thought  of 
his  wife,  spoke  of  his  wife,  planned  some 
thoughtful  little  surprise  or  gift  for  her. 

You  know,  they  won't  let  wives  come  to 
the  Front.  Women  can  come  into  the  War 
2k)ne,  on  various  pretexts,  but  wives  cannot. 
Wives,  it  appears,  are  bad  for  the  morale  of 


102       The  Backwash  of  War 

the  Army.  They  come  with  their  troubles, 
to  talk  of  how  business  is  failing,  of  how  things 
are  going  to  the  bad  at  home,  because  of  the 
war;  of  how  great  the  struggle,  how  bitter 
the  trials  and  the  poverty  and  hardship. 
They  establish  the  connecting  link  between 
the  soldier  and  his  life  at  home,  his  life  that 
he  is  compelled  to  resign.  Letters  can  be 
censored  and  all  disturbing  items  cut  out, 
but  if  a  wife  is  permitted  to  come  to  the  War 
Zone,  to  see  her  husband,  there  is  no  censor- 
ing the  things  she  may  tell  him.  The  dis- 
quieting, disturbing  things.  So  she  herself 
must  be  censored,  not  permitted  to  come. 
So  for  long  weary  months  men  must  remain 
at  the  Front,  on  active  inactivity,  and  their 
wives  cannot  come  to  see  them.  Only  other 
people's  wives  may  come.  It  is  not  the 
woman  but  the  wife  that  is  objected  to. 
There  is  a  difference.  In  war,  it  is  very 
great. 

There  are   many   women   at   the   Front. 


Women  and  Wives  103 

How  do  they  get  there,  to  the  Zone  of  the 
Armies?  On  various  pretexts — to  see  sick 
relatives,  in  such  and  such  hospitals,  or  to 
see  other  relatives,  brothers,  uncles,  cousins, 
other  people's  husbands — oh,  there  are  many 
reasons  which  make  it  possible  for  them  to 
come.  And  always  there  are  the  Belgian 
women,  who  live  in  the  War  Zone,  for  at 
present  there  is  a  little  strip  of  Belgitun  left, 
and  all  the  civilians  have  not  been  evacuated 
from  the  Army  Zone.  So  there  are  plenty 
of  women,  first  and  last.  Better  ones  for 
the  officers,  naturally,  just  as  the  officers' 
mess  is  of  better  quality  than  that  of  the 
common  soldiers.  But  always  there  are 
plenty  of  women.  Never  wives,  who  mean 
responsibility,  but  just  women,  who  only 
mean  distraction  and  amusement,  just  as 
food  and  wine.  So  wives  are  forbidden, 
because  lowering  to  the  morale,  but  women 
are  winked  at,  because  they  cheer  and  refresh 
the  troops.    After  the  war,  it  is  hoped  that 


104        The  Backwash  of  War 

all  unmarried  soldiers  will  marry,  but  doubt- 
less they  will  not  marry  these  women  who 
have  served  and  cheered  them  in  the  War 
Zone.  That,  again,  would  be  depressing  to 
the  country's  morale.  It  is  rather  paradox- 
ical, but  there  are  those  who  can  explain 
it  perfectly. 

No,  no,  I  don't  understand.  It's  because 
everything  has  two  sides.  You  would  be 
surprised  to  pick  up  a  franc,  and  find  Liberty, 
Equality,  and  Fraternity  on  one  side,  and 
on  the  other,  the  image  of  the  Sower  smoothed 
out.  A  rose  is  a  fine  rose  because  of  the 
manure  you  put  at  its  roots.  You  don't 
get  a  medal  for  sustained  nobility.  You 
get  it  for  the  impetuous  action  of  the  moment, 
an  action  quite  out  of  keeping  with  the  trend 
of  one's  daily  life.  You  speak  of  the  young 
aviator  who  was  decorated  for  destroying 
a  Zeppelin  single-handed,  and  in  the  next 
breath  you  add,  and  he  killed  himself,  a  few 
days  later,  by  attempting  to  fly  when  he  was 


Women  and  Wives  105 

drunk.  So  it  goes.  There  is  a  dirty  sedi- 
ment at  the  bottom  of  most  sotils.  War, 
superb  as  it  is,  is  not  necessarily  a  filtering 
process,  by  which  men  and  nations  may  be 
purified.  Well,  there  are  many  people  to  write 
you  of  the  noble  side,  the  heroic  side,  the  ex- 
alted side  of  war.  I  must  write  you  of  what 
I  have  seen,  the  other  side,  the  backwash. 
They  are  both  true.  In  Spain,  they  bang 
their  silver  coins  upon  a  marble  slab,  ac- 
cepting the  stamp  upon  both  sides,  and  then 
decide  whether  as  a  whole  they  ring  true. 
Every  now  and  then,  Armand,  the  orderly, 
goes  to  the  village  to  get  a  bath.  He  comes 
back  with  very  clean  hands  and  nails,  and 
says  that  it  has  greatly  solaced  him,  the  warm 
water.  Then  later,  that  same  evening,  he 
gets  permission  to  be  absent  from  the  hospi- 
tal, and  he  goes  to  our  village  to  a  girl.  But 
he  is  always  as  eager,  as  nervous  for  his  wife's 
letter  as  ever.  It  is  the  same  with  Simon, 
the  young  surgeon.     Only  Simon  keeps  him- 


io6       The  Backwash  of  War 

self  pretty  clean  at  all  times,  as  he  has  an 
orderly  to  bring  him  pitchers  of  hot  water 
every  morning,  as  many  as  he  wants.  But 
Simon  has  a  girl  in  the  village,  to  whom  he 
goes  every  week.  Only,  why  does  he  talk 
so  incessantly  about  his  wife,  and  show  her 
pictures  to  me,  to  everyone  about  the  place? 
Why  should  we  all  be  bored  with  tales  of 
Simon's  stupid  wife,  when  that's  all  she 
means  to  him?  Only  perhaps  she  means 
more.     I  told  you  I  did  not  understand. 

Then  the  Gestionnaire,  the  little  fat  man 
in  khaki,  who  is  purveyor  to  the  hospital. 
Every  night  he  commandeers  an  ambulance, 
and  drives  back  into  the  country,  to  a  village 
twelve  miles  away,  to  sleep  with  a  woman. 
And  the  old  doctor — he  is  sixty-four  and 
has  grandchildren — he  goes  down  to  our 
village  for  a  little  girl  of  fourteen.  He  was 
decorated  with  the  Legion  of  Honour  the 
other  day.     It  seems  incongruous. 

Oh  yes,  of  course  these  were  decent  girls 


Women  and  Wives  107 

at  the  start,  at  the  beginning  of  the  war. 
But  you  know  women,  how  they  run  after 
men,  especially  when  the  men  wear  uniforms, 
all  gilt  buttons  and  braid.  It's  not  the  men's 
fault  that  most  of  the  women  in  the  War 
Zone  are  ruined.  Have  you  ever  watched 
the  village  girls  when  a  regiment  comes 
through,  or  stops  for  a  night  or  two,  en  repos, 
on  its  way  to  the  Front?  Have  you  seen 
the  girls  make  fools  of  themselves  over  the 
men?  Well,  that's  why  there  are  so  many 
accessible  for  the  troops.  Of  course  the 
professional  prostitutes  from  Paris  aren't 
admitted  to  the  War  Zone,  but  the  Belgian 
girls  made  such  fools  of  themselves,  the 
others  weren't  needed. 

Across  the  lines,  back  of  the  German  lines, 
in  the  invaded  districts,  it  is  different.  The 
conquering  armies  just  ruined  all  the  women 
they  could  get  hold  of.  Any  one  will  tell 
you  that.  Ces  sales  Bosches!  For  it  is 
inconceivable  how  any  decent  girl,  even  a 


io8        The  Backwash  of  War 

Belgian,  could  give  herself  up  voluntarily 
to  a  Hun!  They  used  force,  those  brutes! 
That  is  the  difference.  It's  all  the  difference 
in  the  world.  No,  the  women  over  there 
didn't  make  fools  of  themselves  over  those 
men — how  could  they !  No,  no.  Over  there, 
in  the  invaded  districts,  the  Germans  forced 
those  girls.  Here,  on  this  side,  the  girls 
cajoled  the  men  till  they  gave  in.  Can't 
you  see?  You  must  be  pro-German!  Any 
way,  they  are  all  ruined  and  not  fit  for  any 
decent  man  to  mate  with,  after  the  war. 

They  are  pretty  dangerous,  too,  some  of 
these  women.  No,  I  don't  mean  in  that 
way.  But  they  act  as  spies  for  the  Germans 
and  get  a  lot  of  information  out  of  the  men, 
and  send  it  back,  somehow,  into  the  German 
lines.  The  Germans  stop  at  nothing,  noth- 
ing is  too  dastardly,  too  low,  for  them  to 
attempt.  There  were  two  Belgian  girls 
once,  who  lived  together  in  a  room,  in  a  little 
village  back  of  our  lines.     They  were  natives, 


Women  and  Wives  109 

and  had  always  lived  there,  so  of  course 
they  were  not  turned  out,  and  when  the 
village  was  shelled  from  time  to  time,  they 
did  not  seem  to  mind  and  altogether  they 
made  a  lot  of  money.  They  only  received 
officers.  The  common  soldiers  were  just 
dirt  to  them,  and  they  refused  to  see  them. 
Certain  women  get  known  in  a  place,  as 
those  who  receive  soldiers  and  those  who 
receive  officers.  These  girls  were  intelligent, 
too,  and  always  asked  a  lot  of  intelligent, 
interested  questions,  and  you  know  a  man 
when  he  is  excited  will  answer  unsuspectingly 
any  question  put  to  him.  The  Germans 
took  advantage  of  that.  It  is  easy  to  be  a 
spy.  Just  know  what  questions  you  must 
ask,  and  it  is  surprising  how  much  informa- 
tion you  can  get.  The  thing  is,  to  know 
upon  what  point  information  is  wanted. 
These  girls  knew  that,  it  seems,  and  so  they 
asked  a  lot  of  intelligent  questions,  and  as 
they  received  only  officers,  they  got  a  good 


1 10       The  Backwash  of  War 

lot  of  valuable  information,  for  as  I  say, 
when  a  man  is  excited  he  will  answer  many- 
questions.  Besides,  who  could  have  sus- 
pected at  first  that  these  two  girls  were  spies? 
But  they  were,  as  they  found  out  finally, 
after  several  months.  Their  rooms  were 
one  day  searched,  and  a  mass  of  incriminat- 
ing papers  were  discovered.  It  seems  the 
Germans  had  taken  these  girls  from  their 
families — held  their  families  as  hostages — 
and  had  sent  them  across  into  the  English 
lines,  with  threats  of  vile  reprisals  upon  their 
families  if  they  did  not  produce  information 
of  value.  Wasn't  it  beastly !  Making  these 
girls  prostitutes  and  spies,  upon  pain  of 
reprisals  upon  their  families.  The  Germans 
knew  they  were  so  attractive  that  they  would 
receive  only  officers.  That  they  would 
receive  many  cUents,  of  high  rank,  of  much 
information,  who  would  readily  fall  victims 
to  their  wiles.  Theyarevery  vile  themselves, 
these  Germans.     The  curious  thing  is,  how 


Women  and  Wives  iii 

well  they  understand  how  to  bait  a  trap  for 
their  enemies.  In  spite  of  having  nothing 
in  common  with  them,  how  well  they  under- 
stand the  nature  of  those  who  are  fighting 
in  the  name  of  Justice,  of  Liberty  and 
Civilization. 

Paris, 
4  May,  19 16. 


Pour  la  Patrie 


"3 


POUR    LA  PATRIE 

T^HIS  is  how  it  was.  It  is  pretty  much 
■*•  always  Hke  this  in  a  field  hospital. 
Just  ambulances  rolling  in,  and  dirty,  dying 
men,  and  the  guns  off  there  in  the  distance! 
Very  monotonous,  and  the  same,  day  after 
day,  till  one  gets  so  tired  and  bored.  Big 
things  may  be  going  on  over  there,  on  the 
other  side  of  the  captive  balloons  that  we 
can  see  from  a  distance,  but  we  are  always 
here,  on  this  side  of  them,  and  here,  on  this 
side  of  them,  it  is  always  the  same.  The 
weariness  of  it — the  sameness  of  it!  The 
same  ambulances,  and  dirty  men,  and  groans, 
or  silence.  The  same  hot  operating  rooms, 
the  same  beds,  always  full,  in  the  wards. 
This  is  war.  But  it  goes  on  and  on,  over 
and  over,  day  after  day,  till  it  seems  like 
"5 


ii6       The  Backwash  of  War 

life.  Life  in  peace  time.  It  might  be  life 
in  a  big  city  hospital,  so  alike  is  the  routine. 
Only  the  city  hospitals  are  bigger,  and  better 
equipped,  and  the  ambulances  are  smarter, 
and  the  patients  don't  always  come  in  am- 
bulances— they  walk  in  sometimes,  or  come 
in  street  cars,  or  in  limousines,  and  they  are 
of  both  sexes,  men  and  women,  and  have 
ever  so  many  things  the  matter  with  them 
— the  hospitals  of  peace  time  are  not  nearly 
so  stupid,  so  monotonous,  as  the  hospitals 
of  war.  Bah!  War's  humane  compared 
to  peace!  More  spectacular,  I  grant  you, 
more  acute, — that's  what  interests  us, — ^but 
for  the  sheer  agony  of  life — oh,  peace  is  way 
ahead ! 

War  is  so  clean.  Peace  is  so  dirty.  There 
are  so  many  foul  diseases  in  peace  times. 
They  drag  on  over  so  many  years,  too.  No, 
war's  clean!  I'd  rather  see  a  man  die  in 
prime  of  life,  in  war  time,  than  see  him  dod- 
dering along  in  peace  time,  broken  hearted, 


Pour  la  Patrie  117 

broken  spirited,  life  broken,  and  very  weary, 
having  suffered  many  things, — to  die  at 
last,  at  a  good,  ripe  age!  How  they  have 
suffered,  those  who  drive  up  to  our  city 
hospitals  inlimousines,  in  peace  time.  What's 
been  saved  them,  those  who  die  young, 
and  clean  and  swiftly,  here  behind  the 
guns.  In  the  long  run  it  dots  up  just 
the  same.  Only  war's  spectacular,  that's 
all. 

Well,  he  came  in  like  the  rest,  only  older 
than  most  of  them.  A  shock  of  iron-grey 
hair,  a  mane  of  it,  above  heavy,  black  brows, 
and  the  brows  were  contracted  in  pain. 
Shot,  as  usual,  in  the  abdomen.  He  spent 
three  hours  on  the  table  after  admission — 
the  operating  table — and  when  he  came  over 
to  the  ward,  they  said,  not  a  dog's  chance 
for  him.  No  more  had  he.  When  he  came 
out  of  ether,  he  said  he  didn't  want  to  die. 
He  said  he  wanted  to  live.  Very  much.  He 
said  he  wanted  to  see  his  wife  again  and  his 


ii8        The  Backwash  of  War 

children.  Over  and  over  he  insisted  on  this, 
insisted  on  getting  well.  He  caught  hold 
of  the  doctor's  hand  and  said  he  must  get 
well,  that  the  doctor  must  get  him  well. 
Then  the  doctor  drew  away  his  slim  fingers 
from  the  rough,  imploring  grasp,  and  told 
him  to  be  good  and  patient. 

"Be  good!  Be  patient!"  said  the  doctor, 
and  that  was  all  he  could  say,  for  he  was 
honest.  What  else  could  he  say,  knowing 
that  there  were  eighteen  little  holes,  cut  by 
the  bullet,  leaking  poison  into  that  gashed, 
distended  abdomen?  When  these  little  holes, 
that  the  doctor  could  not  stop,  had  leaked 
enough  poison  into  his  system,  he  would  die. 
Not  today,  no,  but  day  after  tomorrow. 
Three  days  more. 

So  all  that  first  day,  the  man  talked  of 
getting  well.  He  was  insistent  on  that.  He 
was  confident.  Next  day,  the  second  of  the 
three  days  the  doctor  gave  him,  very  much 
pain  laid   hold  of  ^  him.     His  black  brows 


Pour  la  Patrie    .  119 

bent  with  pain  and  he  grew  puzzled.  How 
could  one  live  with  such  pain  as  that? 

That  afternoon,  about  five  o'clock,  came 
the  General.  The  one  who  decorates  the 
men.  He  had  no  sword,  just  a  riding  whip, 
so  he  tossed  the  whip  on  the  bed,  for  you 
can't  do  an  accolade  with  anything  but  a 
sword.  Just  the  Medaille  Militaire.  Not 
the  other  one.  But  the  Medaille  Militaire 
carries  a  pension  of  a  hundred  francs  a  year, 
so  that's  something.  So  the  General  said, 
very  briefly:  "In  the  name  of  the  Republic 
of  France,  I  confer  upon  you  the  Medaille 
Militaire."  Then  he  bent  over  and  kissed 
the  man  on  his  forehead,  pinned  the  medal 
to  the  bedspread,  and  departed. 

There  you  are!  Just  a  brief  little  cere- 
mony, and  perfunctory.  We  all  got  that 
impression.  The  General  has  decorated  so 
many  dying  men.  And  this  one  seemed  so 
nearly  dead.  He  seemed  half-conscious. 
Yet  the  General  might  have  put  a  little  more 


120       The  Backwash  of  War 

feeling  into  it,  not  made  it  quite  so  perfunc- 
tory. Yet  he's  done  this  thing  so  many, 
many  times  before.  It's  all  right,  he  does 
it  differently  when  there  are  people  about, 
but  this  time  there  was  no  one  present — just 
the  doctor,  the  dying  man,  and  me.  And  so 
we  four  knew  what  it  meant — just  a  widow's 
pension.  Therefore  there  wasn't  any  reason 
for  the  accolade,  for  the  sonorous,  ringing 
phrases  of  a  dress  parade 

We  all  knew  what  it  meant.  So  did  the 
man.  When  he  got  the  medal,  he  knew  too. 
He  knew  there  wasn't  any  hope.  I  held  the 
medal  before  him,  after  the  General  had 
gone,  in  its  red  plush  case.  It  looked  cheap, 
somehow.  The  exchange  didn't  seem  even. 
He  pushed  it  aside  with  a  contemptuous 
hand  sweep,  a  disgusted  shrug. 

"I've  seen  these  things  before!"  he 
exclaimed.  We  all  had  seen  them  too. 
We  all  knew  about  them,  he  and  the  doc- 
tor, and  the  General  and  I.    He  knew  and 


Pour  la  Patxie  I2i 

understood,  most  of  all.  And  his  tone  was 
bitter. 

After  that,  he  knew  the  doctor  couldn't 
save  him,  and  that  he  should  not  see  his  wife 
and  children  again.  Whereupon  he  became 
angry  with  the  treatment,  and  protested 
against  it.  The  picqures  hurt — they  hurt 
very  much,andhe  did  not  want  them.  More- 
over, they  did  no  good,  for  his  pain  was  now 
very  intense,  and  he  tossed  and  tossed  to 
get  away  from  it. 

So  the  third  day  dawned,  and  he  was  alive, 
and  dying,  and  knew  that  he  was  dying. 
Which  is  unusual  and  disconcerting.  He 
turned  over  and  over,  and  black  fluid  vomited 
from  his  mouth  into  the  white  enamel  basin. 
From  time  to  time,  the  orderly  emptied  the 
basin,  but  always  there  was  more,  and  always 
he  choked  and  gasped  and  knit  his  brows  in 
pain.  Once  his  face  broke  up  as  a  child's 
breaks  up  when  it  cries.  So  he  cried  in  pain 
and  loneliness  and  resentment. 


122        The  Backwash  of  War 

He  struggled  hard  to  hold  on.  He  wanted 
very  much  to  live,  but  he  could  not  do  it. 
He  said:  '^  Je  ne  tiens  plus.** 

Which  was  true.  He  couldn't  hold  on. 
The  pain  was  too  great.  He  clenched  his 
hands  and  writhed,  and  cried  out  for  mercy. 
But  what  mercy  had  we?  We  gave  him 
morphia,  but  it  did  not  help.  So  he  con- 
tinued to  cry  to  us  for  mercy,  he  cried  to  us 
and  to  God.  Between  us,  we  let  him  suffer 
eight  hours  more  like  that,  us  and  God. 

Then  I  called  the  priest.  We  have  three 
priests  on  the  ward,  as  orderlies,  and  I  got 
one  of  them  to  give  him  the  Sacrament.  I 
thought  it  would  quiet  him.  We  could  not 
help  him  with  drugs,  and  he  had  not  got 
it  quite  in  his  head  that  he  must  die,  and 
when  he  said,  "I  am  dying,"  he  expected  to 
be  contradicted.  So  I  asked  Capolarde  to 
give  him  the  Sacrament,  and  he  said  yes, 
and  put  a  red  screen  around  the  bed,  to 
screen  him  from  the  ward.     Then  Capolarde 


Pour  la  Patrie  123 

turned  to  me  and  asked  me  to  leave.  It  was 
summer  time.  The  window  at  the  head  of 
the  bed  was  open,  the  hay  outside  was  new 
cut  and  piled  into  Uttle  haycocks.  Over  in 
the  distance  the  gims  rolled.  As  I  turned 
to  go,  I  saw  Capolarde  holding  a  tray  of  Holy 
Oils  in  one  hand,  while  with  the  other  he 
emptied  the  basin  containing  black  vomitus 
out  the  window. 

No,  it  did  not  bring  him  comfort,  or  resigna- 
tion. He  fought  against  it.  He  wanted  to 
hve,  and  he  resented  Death,  very  bitteriy. 
Down  at  my  end  of  the  ward — it  was  a  silent, 
summer  afternoon — I  heard  them  very  clearly. 
I  heard  the  low  words  from  behind  the  screen. 

"Dites:  *Dieu  je  vous  donne  ma  vie  Ubre- 
ment  pour  ma  patrie''  (God,  I  give  you  my 
life  freely  for  my  coimtry).  The  priests 
usually  say  that  to  them,  for  death  has  more 
dignity  that  way.  It  is  not  in  the  ritual, 
but  it  makes  a  soldier's  death  more  noble. 
So  I  suppose  Capolarde  said  it.     I  could  only 


124       The  Backwash  of  War 

judge  by  the  response.  I  could  hear  the  heavy, 
laboured  breath,  the  choking,  wailing  cry. 

"Ouil  Old!''  gasped  out  at  intervals. 
"AhmonDieu!    Ouif* 

Again  the  mumbling,  guiding  whisper. 

"Out — ouir*  came  sobbing,  gasping,  in 
response. 

So  I  heard  the  whispers,  the  priest's  whis- 
pers, and  the  stertorous  choke,  the  feeble, 
wailing,  rebellious  wailing  in  response.  He 
was  being  forced  into  it.  Forced  into  accept- 
ance. Beaten  into  submission,  beaten  into 
resignation. 

"Oui,  out"  came  the  protesting  moans. 
"Ah,  ouif' 

It  must  be  dawning  upon  him  now.  Capo- 
larde  is  making  him  see. 

"Out!  Oui!"  The  choking  sobs  reach 
me.  "Ah,  mon  Dieu,  out!"  Then  very 
deep,  panting,  crying  breaths : 

"Dieu — je — vous — donne  — ma — vie — libre- 
ment — pour — ma — patriel ' ' 


Pour  la  Patrie  125 

" Librement!  Lihrement!  Ah,ouil  Out!** 
He  was  beaten  at  last.  The  choking,  dying, 
bewildered  man  had  said  the  noble  words. 

"God,  I  give  you  my  life  freely  for  my 
country!" 

After  which  came  a  volley  of  low  toned 
Latin  phrases,  rattling  in  the  stillness  like 
the  popping  of  a  mitrailleuse. 

Two  hours  later  he  was  still  alive,  restless, 
but  no  longer  resentful.  "It  is  difficult  to 
go,"  he  murmured,  and  then:  "Tonight,  I 
shall  sleep  well."  A  long  pause  followed,  and 
he  opened  his  eyes. 

"Without  doubt,  the  next  world  is  more 
chic  than  this,"  he  remarked  smiling,  and 
then: 

"I  was  mobilized  against  my  inclination. 
Now  I  have  won  the  Medaille  Militaire. 
My  Captain  won  it  for  me.  He  made  me 
brave.    He  had  a  revolver  in  his  hand." 


Locomotor  Ataxia 


127 


LOCOMOTOR  ATAXIA 

JUST  inside  the  entrance  gates  a  big,  flat- 
^  topped  tent  was  pitched,  which  bore 
over  the  low  door  a  signboard  on  which  was 
painted,  Triage  No.  i.  Malades  et  Blesses 
Assis.  This  meant  that  those  assis,  able 
to  travel  in  the  ambulances  as  "sitters," 
were  to  be  deposited  here  for  diagnosis  and 
classification.  Over  beyond  was  the  Salle 
d*AUente,  the  hut  for  receiving  the  grands 
blessSs,  but  a  tent  was  sufficient  for  sick  men 
and  those  slightly  wounded.  It  was  an  old 
tent,  weatherbeaten,  a  dull,  dirty  grey. 
Within  the  floor  was  of  earth,  and  along 
each  side  ran  long,  narrow,  backless  benches, 
on  which  the  sick  men  and  the  slightly 
woimded  sat,  waiting  sorting.  A  grey 
twilight    pervaded    the    interior,    and    the 

9  "9 


130       The  Backwash  of  War 

everlasting  Belgian  rain  beat  down  upon 
the  creaking  canvas,  beat  down  in  gentle, 
dripping  patters,  or  in  hard,  noisy  gusts,  as 
it  happened.  It  was  always  dry  inside, 
however,  and  the  earth  floor  was  dusty, 
except  at  the  entrance,  where  a  triangle  of 
mud  projected  almost  to  the  doctor's  table, 
in  the  middle. 

The  Salle  d'Attente  was  different.  It  was 
more  comfortable.  The  seriously  wounded 
were  unloaded  carefully  and  placed  upon 
beds  covered  with  rubber  sheeting,  and  clean 
sacking,  which  protected  the  thin  mattresses 
from  blood.  The  patients  were  afterwards 
covered  with  red  blankets,  and  stone  hot 
water  bottles  were  also  given  them,  some- 
times. But  in  the  sorting  tent  there  were 
no  such  comforts.  They  were  not  needed. 
The  sick  men  and  the  slightly  woimded  could 
sit  very  well  on  the  backless  benches  till  the 
Medecin  Major  had  time  to  come  and  examine 
them. 


Locomotor  Ataxia  131 

Quite  a  company  of  "sitters"  were  as- 
sembled here  one  morning,  helped  out  of  two 
big  ambulances  that  drove  in  within  ten 
minutes  of  each  other.  They  were  a  dejected 
lot,  and  they  stumbled  into  the  tent  unstead- 
ily, groping  towards  the  benches,  upon  which 
they  tried  to  pose  their  weary,  old,  fevered 
bodies  in  comfortable  attitudes.  And  as  it 
couldn't  be  done,  there  was  a  continual 
shifting  movement,  and  unrest.  Heavy  legs 
in  heavy  wet  boots  were  shoved  stiffly  for- 
ward, then  dragged  back  again.  Old,  thin 
bodies  bent  forward,  twisted  sideways, 
coarse,  filthy  hands  hung  supine  between 
spread  knees,  and  then  again  the  hands 
would  change,  and  support  whiskered,  dis- 
coiu-aged  faces.  They  were  all  imcouth, 
grotesque,  dejected,  and  they  smelt  abom- 
inably, these  poilus,  these  hairy,  unkempt 
soldiers.  At  their  feet,  their  sacks  lay, 
bulging  with  their  few  possessions.  They 
hadn't  much,  but  all  they  had  lay  there,  at 


132       The  Backwash  of  War 

their  feet.  Old  brown  canvas  sacks,  bulg- 
ing, muddy,  worn,  worn-out,  like  their  own- 
ers. Tied  on  the  outside  were  water  cans, 
and  extra  boots,  and  bayonets,  and  inside 
were  socks  and  writing  paper  and  photographs 
of  ugly  wives.  Therefore  the  ungainly  sacks 
were  precious,  and  they  hugged  them  with 
their  tired  feet,  afraid  that  they  might  lose 
them. 

Then  finally  the  Major  arrived,  and  began 
the  business  of  sorting  them.  He  was  brisk 
and  alert,  and  he  called  them  one  by  one  to 
stand  before  him.  They  shuffled  up  to  his 
little  table,  wavering,  deprecating,  humble, 
and  answered  his  brief  impatient  questions. 
And  on  the  spot  he  made  snap  diagnoses, 
such  as  rheumatism,  bronchitis,  kicked  by  a 
horse,  knocked  down  by  despatch  rider, 
dysentery,  and  so  on — a  paltry,  stupid  lot 
of  ailrrients  and  minor  accidents,  demanding 
a  few  days,  treatment.  It  was  a  dull  service, 
this  medical  service,  yet  one  had  to  be  always 


Locomotor  Ataxia  133 

on  guard  against  contagion,  so  the  service  was 
a  responsible  one.  But  the  Major  worked 
quickly,  sorted  them  out  hastily,  and  then 
one  by  one  they  disappeared  behind  a  hang- 
ing sheet,  where  the  orderlies  took  off  their 
old  uniforms,  washed  the  patients  a  little, 
and  then  led  them  to  the  wards.  It  was  a 
stupid  service!  So  different  from  that  of 
the  grands  blesses!  There  was  some  interest 
in  that!  But  this  eclope  business,  these 
minor  ailments,  this  stream  of  petty  sick- 
ness, petty  accidents,  dirty  skin  diseases,  and 
vermin — all  war,  if  you  like,  but  how  hanalel 

Later,  in  the  medical  wards,  the  Major 
made  his  rounds,  to  inspect  more  carefully 
the  men  upon  whom  he  had  made  snap  diag- 
noses, to  correct  the  diagnosis,  if  need  be, 
and  to  order  treatment.  The  chief  treat- 
ment they  needed  was  a  bath,  a  clean  bed, 
and  a  week  of  sleep,  but  the  doctor,  being 
fairly  conscientious,  thought  to  hurry  things 


134       The  Backwash  of  War 

a  little,  to  hasten  the  return  of  these  old, 
tired  men  to  the  trenches,  so  that  they  might 
come  back  to  the  hospital  again  as  grands 
blessSs.  In  which  event  they  would  be 
interesting.  So  he  ordered  ventouses  or 
cupping,  for  the  bronchitis  cases.  There  is 
much  bronchitis  in  Flanders,  in  the  trenches, 
because  of  the  incessant  Belgian  rain.  They 
are  sick  with  it  too,  poor  devils.  So  said  the 
Major  to  himself  as  he  made  his  rounds. 

Five  men  here,  lying  in  a  row,  all  ptomaine 
poisoning,  due  to  some  rank  tinned  stuff 
they'd  been  eating.  Yonder  there,  three 
men  with  itch — filthy  business !  Their  hands 
all  covered  with  it,  tearing  at  their  bodies 
with  their  black,  claw-like  nails !  The  order- 
lies had  not  washed  them  very  thoroughly 
— small  blame  to  them !  So  the  Major  made 
his  rounds,  walking  slowly,  very  bored,  but 
conscientious.  These  dull  wrecks  were 
needed  in  the  trenches.  He  must  make 
them  well. 


Locomotor  Ataxia  135 

At  Bed  9,  Andre  stopped.  Something 
different  this  time'.  He  tried  to  recall  it. 
Oh  yes — in  the  sorting  tent  he'd  noticed 

"Monsieur  Major!**  A  thin  hand,  clean 
and  sHm,  rose  to  the  salute.  The  bed  covers 
were  very  straight,  sliding  neither  to  this 
side  nor  to  that,  as  covers  slide  under  restless 
pain. 

"I  cannot  walk.  Monsieur  Major.** 

So  Andre  stopped,  attentive.  The  man 
continued. 

"I  cannot  walk,  Monsieur  Major.  Be- 
cause of  that,  from  the  trenches  I  was  re- 
moved a  month  ago.  After  that  I  was  given 
a  fourgon,  a  wagon  in  which  to  transport 
the  loaves  of  bread.  But  soon  it  arrived 
that  I  could  not  climb  to  the  high  seat  of  my 
wagon,  nor  could  I  mount  to  the  saddle  of 
my  horse.  So  I  was  obliged  to  lead  my 
horses,  stiunbling  at  their  bridles.  So  I  have 
stumbled  for  the  past  four  weeks.  But  now 
I  cannot  even  do  that.     It  is  very  painful." 


136       The  Backwash  of  War 

Andr6  passed  a  hand  over  his  short,  thick, 
upright  hair,  and  smoothed  his  stiff  brush 
reflectively.  Then  he  put  questions  to  the 
man,  confidentially,  and  at  the  answers  con- 
tinued to  rub  backward  his  tight  brush  of 
hair.  After  which  he  disappeared  from  the 
ward  for  a  time,  but  returned  presently, 
bringing  with  him  a  Paris  surgeon  who  hap- 
pened to  be  visiting  the  Front  that  day. 
There  also  came  with  him  another  little 
doctor  of  the  hospital  staff,  who  was  inter- 
ested in  what  Andr6  had  told  him  of  the 
case.  The  three  stood  together  at  the  foot 
of  the  bed,  stroking  their  beards  and  their 
hair  meditatively,  while  they  plied  the  patient 
with  questions.  After  which  they  directed 
Alphonse,  the  swarthy,  dark  orderly,  who 
looked  like  a  brigand,  and  Henri,  the  priest- 
orderly,  to  help  the  patient  to  rise. 

They  stood  him  barefoot  upon  the  floor, 
supporting  him  slightly  by  each  elbow.  To 
his  knees,  or  just  above  them,  fell  a  scant, 


Locomotor  Ataxia  137 

gay,  pink  flannel  nightshirt,  his  sole  garment. 
It  was  one  of  many  warm,  gay  nightshirts, 
pink  and  cheerful,  that  some  women  of 
America  had  sent  over  to  the  wounded  heroes 
of  France.  It  made  a  bright  spot  of  colour 
in  the  sombre  ward,  and  through  the  open 
window,  one  caught  glimpses  of  green  hop 
fields,  and  awindmill  in  the  distance,  waving 
its  slow  arms. 

"Walk,"  commanded  Andr6.  "Walk  to 
the  door.     Turn  and  return." 

The  man  staggered  between  the  beds, 
holding  to  them,  half  bent  over,  fearful. 
Cool  summer  air  blew  in  through  the  window, 
waving  the  pink  nightshirt,  making  goose 
flesh  rise  on  the  shapely  white  legs  that 
wavered.  Then  he  moved  down  the  ward, 
between  the  rows  of  beds,  moving  with  un- 
certain, running,  halting  steps.  Upon  the 
linoleum,  his  bare  feet  flapped  in  soft  thiunps, 
groping  wildly,  interfering,  knocking  against 
each   other.     The   man,    trying   to   control 


138       The  Backwash  of  War 

them,  gazed  in  fright  from  side  to  side. 
Down  to  the  door  he  padded,  rocked,  swayed, 
turned  and  almost  fell.  Then  back  again 
he  flapped. 

Dense  stillness  in  the  ward,  broken  only 
by  the  hard,  unsteady  thumping  of  the  bare 
feet.  The  feet  masterless,  as  the  spirit  had 
been  masterless,  years  ago.  The  three  judges 
in  white  blouses  stood  with  arms  folded, 
motionless.  The  patients  in  the  beds  sat 
up  and  tittered.  The  man  who  had  been 
kicked  by  a  horse  raised  himself  and  smiled. 
He  who  had  been  knocked  down  by  a  de- 
spatch rider  sat  up,  as  did  those  with 
bronchitis,  and  those  with  ptomaine 
poisoning.  They  sat  up,  looked,  and  snig- 
gered. They  knew.  So  did  Andre.  So 
did  the  Paris  surgeon,  and  the  little  staff 
doctor,  and  the  swarthy  orderly  and  the 
priest-orderly.  They  all  knew.  The  patient 
knew  too.  The  laughter  of  his  comrades 
told  him. 


Locomotor  Ataxia  139 

So  he  was  to  be  released  from  the  army, 
physically  unfit.  He  could  no  longer  serve 
his  country.  For  many  months  he  had  faced 
death  under  the  guns,  a  glorious  death. 
Now  he  was  to  face  death  in  another  form. 
Not  glorious,  shameful.  Only  he  didn't 
know  much  about  it,  and  couldn't  visualize 
it — after  all,  he  might  possibly  escape.  He 
who  had  so  loved  life.  So  he  was  rather 
pleased  to  be  released  from  service. 

The  patients  in  the  surrounding  beds 
ceased  laughing.  They  had  other  things  to 
think  about.  As  soon  as  they  were  cured  of 
the  dysentery  and  of  the  itch,  they  were 
going  back  again  to  the  trenches,  imder  the 
guns.  So  they  pitied  themselves,  and  they 
rather  envied  him,  being  released  from  the 
army.  They  didn't  know  much  about  it, 
either.  They  couldn't  visualize  an  imbecile, 
degrading,  lingering  death.  They  could  only 
comprehend  escape  from  sudden  death,  under 
the  guns. 


140       The  Backwash  of  War 

One  way  or  another,  it  is  about  the  same. 
Tragedy  either  way,  and  death  either  way. 
But  the  tragedies  of  peace  equal  the  tragedies 
of  war.  The  sum  total  of  suffering  is  the 
same.    They  balance  up  pretty  well. 

Paws, 
i8  June,  1916. 


A  Surgical  Triumph 


HI 


A  SURGICAL  TRIUMPH 

TN  the  Latin  Quarter,  somewhere  about 
^  the  intersection  of  the  Boulevard  Mont- 
parnasse  with  the  rue  de  Rennes — it  might 
have  been  even  a  little  way  back  of  the  Gare 
Montpamasse,  or  perhaps  in  the  other  direc- 
tion where  the  rue  Vabin  cuts  into  the  rue 
Notre-Dame-des-Champs — any  one  who 
knows  the  Quarter  will  know  about  it  at 
once — there  lived  a  little  hairdresser  by  the 
name  of  Antoine.  Some  ten  years  ago 
Antoine  had  moved  over  from  Montmartre, 
for  he  was  a  good  hairdresser  and  a  thrifty 
soul,  and  he  wanted  to  get  on  in  life,  and  at 
that  time  nothing  seemed  to  him  so  profitable 
an  investment  as  to  set  up  a  shop  in  the 
neighbourhood  patronized  by  Americans. 
American  students  were  always  wanting 
143 


144       The  Backwash  of  War 

their  hair  washed,  so  he  was  told — once  a 
week  at  least — and  in  that  they  differed  from 
the  Russian  and  Polish  and  Roumanian  and 
other  students  of  Paris,  a  fact  which  deter- 
mined Antoine  to  go  into  business  at  the 
Montparnasse  end  of  the  Quarter,  rather 
than  at  the  lower  end,  say  round  the  Pan- 
theon and  Saint-Etienne-du-Mont.  And  as 
he  determined  to  put  his  prices  low,  in  order 
to  catch  the  trade,  so  later  on  when  his  busi- 
ness thrived  enormously,  he  continued  to 
keep  them  low,  in  order  to  maintain  his 
clients.  For  if  you  once  get  used  to  having 
your  hair  washed  for  two  francs,  and  very 
well  done  at  that,  it  is  ann03ring  to  find  that 
the  price  has  gone  up  over  night  to  the  prices 
one  pays  on  the  Boulevard  Capucines. 
Therefore  for  ten  years  Antoine  continued 
to  wash  hair  at  two  francs  a  head,  and  at  the 
same  time  he  earned  quite  a  reputation  for 
himself  as  a  marvellous  good  person  when  it 
came  to  waves  and  curls.     So  that  when  the 


A  Surgical  Triumph         145 

war  broke  out,  and  his  American  clients 
broke  and  ran,  he  had  a  neat,  tidy  sum  saved 
up,  and  could  be  fairly  complacent  about  it 
all.  Moreover,  he  was  a  lame  man,  one  leg 
being  some  three  inches  shorter  than  the 
other,  due  to  an  accident  in  childhood,  so  he 
had  never  done  his  military  service  in  his 
youth,  and  while  not  over  military  age,  even 
yet,  there  was  no  likelihood  of  his  ever  being 
called  upon  to  do  it.  So  he  stood  in  the 
doorway  of  his  deserted  shop,  for  all  his 
young  assistants,  his  curlers  and  shampooers, 
had  been  mobilized,  and  looked  up  and  down 
the  deserted  street,  and  congratulated  him- 
self that  he  was  not  in  as  bad  a  plight, 
financially  and  otherwise,  as  some  of  his 
neighbours. 

Next  door  to  him  was  a  restaurant  where 
the  students  ate,  many  of  them.  It  had 
enjoyed  a  high  reputation  for  cheapness,  up 
to  the  war,  and  twice  a  day  had  been  thronged 
with  a  mixed  crowd  of  sculptors  and  painters 


146       The  Backwash  of  War 

and  writers,  and  just  dilettantes,  which 
latter  liked  to  patronize  it  for  what  they  were 
pleased  to  call  "local  colour."  Well,  look 
at  it  now,  thought  the  thrifty  Antoine. 
Everyone  gone,  except  a  dozen  stranded 
students  who  had  not  money  enough  to 
escape,  and  who,  in  the  kindness  of  their 
hearts,  continued  to  eat  here  "on  credit," 
in  order  to  keep  the  proprietor  going.  Even 
such  a  fool  as  the  proprietor  must  see,  sooner 
or  later,  that  patronage  of  this  sort  could 
lead  nowhere,  from  the  point  of  view  of 
profits — in  fact,  it  was  ridiculous. 

Antoine,  lounging  in  his  doorway,  thought 
of  his  son.  His  only  son,  who,  thank  God, 
was  too  young  to  enter  the  army.  By  the 
time  he  was  old  enough  for  his  military 
service,  the  war  would  all  be  over — it  could 
not  last,  at  the  outside,  more  than  six  weeks 
or  a  couple  of  months — so  Antoine  had  no 
cause  for  anxiety  on  that  accoimt.  The  lad 
was  a  fine,  husky  youth,  with  a  sprouting 


A  Surgical  Triumph         147 

moustache,  which  made  him  look  older  than 
his  seventeen  years.  He  was  being  taught 
the  art  of  washing  hair,  and  of  curling  and 
dyeing  the  same,  on  the  himian  head  or  aside 
from  it,  as  the  case  might  be,  and  he  could 
snap  curling  irons  with  a  click  to  inspire 
confidence  in  the  minds  of  the  most  fastidious, 
so  altogether,  thought  Antoine,  he  had  a  good 
future  before  him.  So  the  war  had  no  terrors 
for  Antoine,  and  he  was  able  to  speculate 
freely  upon  the  future  of  his  son,  which 
seemed  like  a  very  bright,  admirable  futtue 
indeed,  in  spite  of  the  distiubances  of  the 
moment.  Nor  did  he  need  to  close  the  doors 
of  his  establishment  either,  in  spite  of  the 
loss  of  his  assistants,  and  the  loss  of  his 
many  customers  who  kept  those  assistants  as 
well  as  himself  busy.  For  there  still  remained 
in  Paris  a  good  many  American  heads 
to  be  washed,  from  time  to  time — 
rather  foolhardy,  adventiu-ous  heads,  curious, 
sensation  hunting  heads,  who  had  remained 


148       The  Backwash  of  War 

in  Paris  to  see  the  war,  or  as  much  of  it  as 
they  could,  in  order  to  enrich  their  own  per- 
sonal experience.  With  which  point  of  view 
Antoine  had  no  quarrel,  although  there 
were  certain  of  his  countrymen  who  wished 
these  inquisitive  foreigners  would  retiim  to 
their  native  land,  for  a  variety  of  reasons. 

As  the  months  rolled  along,  however,  he 
who  had  been  so  farseeing,  so  thrifty  a  busi- 
ness man,  seemed  to  have  made  a  mistake. 
His  calculations  as  to  the  duration  of  the 
war  all  went  wrong.  It  seemed  to  be  lasting 
an  unconscionable  time,  and  every  day  it 
seemed  to  present  new  phases  for  which  no 
immediate  settlement  offered  itself.  Thus  a 
year  dragged  away,  and  Antoine's  son 
turned  eighteen,  and  his  moustache  grew  to 
be  so  imposing  that  his  father  commanded 
him  to  shave  it.  At  the  end  of  another  two 
months,  Antoine  found  it  best  to  return  his 
son  to  short  trousers,  for  although  the  boy 
was  stout  and  fat,  he  was  not  tall,  and  in 


A  Surgical  Triumph         149 

short  trousers  he  looked  merely  an  overgrown 
fat  boy,  and  Antoine  was  growing  rather 
worried  as  he  saw  the  lads  of  the  young 
classes  called  to  the  colours.  Somewhere, 
in  one  of  the  Mairies  of  Paris — over  at  Mont- 
martre,  perhaps,  where  he  had  come  from, 
or  at  the  Prefecture  de  Police,  or  the  Cite — 
Antoine  knew  that  there  a  record  of  his  son's 
age  and  attainments,  which  might  be  used 
against  him  at  any  moment,  and  as  the 
weeks  grew  into  months,  it  seemed  certain 
that  the  class  to  which  this  precious  son 
belonged  would  be  called  on  for  military 
service.  Then  very  hideous  weeks  followed 
for  Antoine,  weeks  of  nervous  suspense  and 
dread.  Day  by  day,  as  the  lad  grew  in 
proficiency  and  aptitude,  as  he  became  more 
and  more  expert  in  the  matters  of  his  trade, 
as  he  learned  a  delicate,  sure  touch  with  the 
most  refractory  hair,  and  could  expend  the 
minimum  of  gas  on  the  drying  machine,  and 
the   minimum   of   soap  lather,   and   withal 


150       The  Backwash  of  War 

attain  the  best  results  in  pleasing  his  custom- 
ers, so  grew  the  danger  of  his  being  snatched 
away  from  this  wide  life  spread  out  before 
him,  of  being  forced  to  fight  for  his  glorious 
country.  Poor  fat  boy!  On  Sundays  he 
used  to  parade  the  Raspail  with  a  German 
shepherd  dog  at  his  heels — bought  two  years 
ago  as  a  German  shepherd,  but  now  called 
a  Belgian  Police  dog — how  could  he  lay  aside 
his  little  trousers  and  become  a  soldier  of 
France!  Yet  every  day  that  time  drew 
nearer,  till  finally  one  day  the  summons 
came,  and  the  lad  departed,  and  Antoine 
closed  his  shutters  for  a  whole  week,  mourn- 
ing desperately.  And  he  was  furious  against 
England,  which  had  not  made  her  maximum 
effort,  had  not  mobilized  her  men,  had  con- 
tinued with  business  as  usual,  had  made  no 
attempt  to  end  the  war — wouldn't  do  so, 
until  France  had  become  exhausted.  And 
he  was  furious  against  Russia,  swamped  in  a 
bog  of  political  intrigue,  which  lacked  organi- 


A  Surgical  Triumph         151 

zation  and  munitions  and  leadership,  and 
was  totally  unable  to  drawing  off  the  Bosches 
on  the  other  frontier,  and  delivering  a  blow 
to  smash  them.  In  fact,  Antoine  was  far 
more  furious  against  the  Allies  of  France  than 
against  Germany  itself.  And  his  rage  and 
grief  absolutely  overbalanced  his  pride  in  his 
son,  or  his  ambitions  as  to  his  son's  possible 
achievements.  The  boy  himself  did  not 
mind  going,  when  he  was  called,  for  he  was 
something  of  a  fataUst,  being  so  young,  and 
besides,  he  could  not  foresee  things.  But 
Antoine,  little  lame  man,  had  much  imagina- 
tion and  foresaw  a  great  deal. 

Mercifully,  he  could  not  foresee  what 
actually  happened.  Thus  it  was  a  shock  to 
him.  He  learned  that  his  son  was  wounded, 
and  then  followed  many  long  weeks  while 
the  boy  lay  in  hospital,  during  which  time 
many  kind-hearted  Red  Cross  ladies  wrote 
to  Antoine,  telling  him  to  be  of  brave  heart 
and  of  good  courage.     And  Antoine,  being 


152       The  Backwash  of  War 

a  rich  man,  in  a  small  hairdressing  way, 
took  quite  large  sums  of  money  out  of  the 
bank  from  time  to  time,  and  sent  them  to  the 
Red  Cross  ladies,  to  buy  for  his  son  whatever 
might  be  necessary  to  his  recovery.  He 
heard  from  the  hospital  in  the  interior — for 
they  were  taking  most  of  the  wounded  to 
the  interior,  at  that  time,  for  fear  of  upsetting 
Paris  by  the  sight  of  them  in  the  streets — 
that  artificial  legs  were  costly.  Thus  he 
steeled  himself  to  the  fact  that  his  son  would 
be  more  hideously  lame  than  he  himself. 
There  was  some  further  consultation  about 
artificial  arms,  rather  vague,  but  Antoine 
was  troubled.  Then  he  learned  that  a  mar- 
vellous operation  had  been  performed  upon 
the  boy,  known  as  plastic  surgery,  that  is  to 
say,  the  rebuilding,  out  of  other  parts  of  the 
body,  of  certain  features  of  the  face  that  are 
missing.  All  this  while  he  heard  nothing 
directly  from  the  lad  himself,  and  in  every 
letter  from  the  Red  Cross  ladies,  dictated 


A  Surgical  Triumph         153 

to  them,  the  boy  begged  that  neither  his 
father  nor  his  mother  would  make  any  at- 
tempt to  visit  him  at  the  hospital,  in  the 
interior,  till  he  was  ready. 

Finally,  the  lad  was  "ready."  He  had 
been  four  or  five  months  in  hospital,  and  the 
best  surgeons  of  the  country  had  done  for 
him  the  best  they  knew.  They  had  not 
only  saved  his  life,  but,  thanks  to  his  father's 
money,  he  had  been  fitted  out  with  certain 
artificial  aids  to  the  human  body  which 
would  go  far  towards  making  life  supportable. 
In  fact,  they  expressed  themselves  as  ex- 
tremely gratified  with  what  they  had  been 
able  to  do  for  the  poor  young  man,  nay, 
they  were  even  proud  of  him.  He  was  a  siu:- 
gical  triumph,  and  as  such  they  were  re- 
turning him  to  Paris,  by  such  and  such  a 
train,  upon  such  and  such  a  day.  Antoine 
went  to  meet  the  train. 

In  a  little  room  back  of  the  hairdressing 
shop,  Antoine  looked  down  upon  the  surgical 


154       The  Backwash  of  War 

triumph.  This  triumph  was  his  son.  The 
two  were  pretty  well  mixed  up.  A  passion 
of  love  and  a  passion  of  furious  resentment 
filled  the  breast  of  the  little  hairdresser. 
Two  very  expensive,  very  good  artificial 
legs  lay  on  the  sofa  beside  the  boy.  They 
were  nicely  jointed  and  had  cost  several 
hundred  francs.  From  the  same  firm  it 
would  also  be  possible  to  obtain  two  very 
nice  artificial  arms,  light,  easily  adjustable, 
well  hinged.  A  hideous  flabby  heap,  called 
a  nose,  fashioned  by  unique  skill  out  of  the 
flesh  of  his  breast,  replaced  the  Uttle  snub 
nose  that  Antoine  remembered.  The  mouth 
they  had  done  little  with.  All  the  front  teeth 
were  gone,  but  these  could  doubtless  be 
replaced,  in  time,  by  others.  Across  the 
lad's  forehead  was  a  black  silk  bandage, 
which  could  be  removed  later,  and  in  his 
pocket  there  was  an  address  from  which 
artificial  eyes  might  be  purchased.  They 
woiild  have  fitted  him  out  with  eyes,  in  the 


A  Surgical  Triumph         155 

provinces,  except  that  such  were  better  ob- 
tainable in  Paris.  Antoine  looked  down 
upon  this  wreck  of  his  son  that  lay  before 
him,  and  the  wreck,  not  appreciating  that  he 
was  a  surgical  triumph,  kept  sobbing,  kept 
weeping  out  of  his  sightless  eyes,  kept  jerking 
his  four  stumps  in  supplication,  kept  begging 
in  agony: 

"Kill  me.  Papa!" 

However,  Antoine  couldn't  do  this,  for  he 
was  civilized. 


At  the  Telephone 


157 


AT  THE  TELEPHONE 

A  S  he  hadn't  died  in  the  ambulance,  com- 
^^  ing  from  the  Poste  de  Secours,  the 
surgeons  concluded  that  they  would  give 
him  another  chance,  and  risk  it  on  the  operat- 
ing table.  He  was  nearly  dead,  anyway, 
so  it  didn't  much  matter,  although  the 
chance  they  proposed  to  give  him  wasn't 
even  a  fighting  chance — it  was  just  one  in  a 
thousand,  some  of  them  put  it  at  one  in  ten 
thousand.  Accordingly,  they  cut  his  clothes 
off  in  the  Salle  d'AUente,  and  carried  him, 
very  dirty  and  naked,  to  the  operating  room. 
Here  they  found  that  his  ten-thousandth 
chance  would  be  diminished  if  they  gave  him 
a  general  anaesthetic,  so  they  dispensed  with 
chloroform  and  gave  him  spinal  anaesthesia, 
159 


i6o       The  Backwash  of  War 

by  injecting  something  into  his  spinal  canal, 
between  two  of  the  low  vertebrae.  This 
completely  relieved  him  of  pain,  but  made 
him  talkative,  and  when  they  saw  he  was 
conscious  like  that,  it  was  decided  to 
hold  a  sheet  across  the  middle  of  him, 
so  that  he  could  not  see  what  was  going 
on,  on  the  other  side  of  the  sheet,  below  his 
waist. 

The  temperature  in  the  operating  room 
was  stifling  hot,  and  the  sweat  poured  in 
drops  from  the  brows  of  the  surgeons,  so 
that  it  took  an  orderly,  with  a  piece  of  gauze, 
to  swab  them  constantly.  However,  for  all 
the  heat,  the  man  was  stone  cold  and  ashen 
grey,  and  his  nostrils  were  pinched  and 
dilated,  while  his  breath  came  in  gasps,  forty 
to  the  minute.  Yet,  as  I  say,  he  was  talk- 
ative, and  his  stream  of  little,  vapid  re- 
marks, at  his  end  of  the  sheet,  did  much 
to  drown  the  clicking  and  snapping  of 
clamps  on  the  other  side  of  it,  where  the 


At  the  Telephone  i6i 

surgeons  were  working  to  give  him  his  one 
chance. 

A  nurse  held  the  sheet  on  one  side  of  the 
table,  and  a  priest-orderly  held  it  at  the 
other,  and  at  his  head  stood  a  doctor,  and 
the  Directrice  and  another  nurse,  answering 
the  string  of  vapid  remarks  and  trying  to 
sooth  him.  And  three  feet  farther  along, 
hidden  from  him  and  the  little  clustering 
company  of  people  trying  to  distract  his 
attention,  stood  the  two  surgeons,  and  the 
two  young  students,  and  just  the  tops  of  their 
hair  could  be  seen  over  the  edge  of  the  sheet. 
They  whispered  a  little  from  time  to  time, 
and  worked  very  rapidly,  and  there  was  quite 
animated  talking  when  the  bone  saw  began 
to  rasp. 

The  man  babbled  of  his  home,  and  of  his 
wife.  He  said  he  wanted  to  see  her  again, 
very  much.  And  the  priest-orderly,  who 
wanted  to  drop  his  end  of  the  sheet  and  ad- 
minister the  last  Sacrament  at  once,  grew 


i62       The  Backwash  of  War 

very  nervous  and  uneasy.  So  the  man 
rambled  on,  gasping,  and  they  replied  to  him 
in  soothing  manner,  and  told  him  that  there 
was  a  chance  that  he  might  see  her  again. 
So  he  talked  about  her  incessantly,  and  with 
affection,  and  his  whispered  words  and  the 
cheery  replies  quite  drowned  out  the  clicking 
and  the  snapping  of  the  clamps.  After  a 
short  while,  however,  his  remarks  grew  less 
coherent,  and  he  seemed  to  find  himself 
back  in  the  trenches,  telephoning.  He  tried 
hard  to  telephone,  he  tried  hard  to  get  the 
connection.  The  wires  seemed  to  be  cut, 
however,  and  he  grew  puzzled,  and  knit  his 
brows  and  swore,  and  tried  again  and  again, 
over  and  over.  He  had  something  to  say 
over  the  telephone,  the  trench  communica- 
tion wire,  and  his  mind  wandered,  and  he 
tried  very  hard,  in  his  wandering  mind,  to 
get  the  connection.  A  shell  had  cut  the 
line  evidently.  He  grew  annoyed  and  rest- 
less, and  gazed  anxiously  and  perplexedly 


At  the  Telephone  163 

at  the  white  sheet,  held  so  steadily  across 
his  middle.  From  the  waist  down  he  could 
not  move,  so  all  his  restlessness  took  place 
on  the  upper  side  of  the  sheet,  and  he  was 
tmaware  of  what  was  going  on  on  the  other 
side  of  it,  and  so  failed  to  hear  the  incessant 
rattle  of  clamps  and  the  subdued  whispers 
from  the  other  side. 

He  struggled  hard  to  get  the  connection, 
in  his  mind,  over  the  telephone.  The  wires 
seemed  to  be  cut,  and  he  cried  out  in  anxiety 
and  distress.  Then  he  grew  more  and  more 
feeble,  and  gasped  more  and  more,  and 
became  almost  inarticulate,  in  his  efforts. 
He  was  distressed.  But  suddenly  he  got  it. 
He  screamed  out  very  loud,  relieved,  satis- 
fied, triumphant,  startling  them  all. 

^' Ca  y  est,  maintenant!  Ca  y  est!  Cest 
le  hon  Dieu  cL  Vappareill^'  (All  right  now! 
All  right!  It  is  the  good  God  at  the 
telephone!)" 

A  drop  of  blood  spotted  the  sheet,  a  sudden 


i64        The  Backwash  of  War 

vivid  drop  which  spread  rapidly,  coming 
through.     The  surgeon  raised  himself. 

"Finished  here!"  he  exclaimed  with  satis- 
faction. 

"Finished  here,"  repeated  the Directrice. 

Paris, 
26  June,  19 16. 


A  Citation 


^65 


A  CITATION 

A  S  a  person,  Grammont  amounted  to  very 
'**■  little.  In  private  life,  before  the  war 
broke  out,  he  had  been  an  acrobat  in  the 
streets  of  Paris,  and  after  that  he  became  a 
hotel  boy  in  some  little  fifth-rate  hotel  over 
behind  the  Gare  St.  Lazare.  That  had 
proved  his  undoing,  for  even  the  fifth-rate 
French  travelling  salesmen  and  sharpers  and 
adventurers  who  patronized  the  hotel  had 
money  enough  for  him  to  steal.  He  stole  a 
little,  favoured  by  his  position  as  gargon 
d'hotel,  and  the  theft  had  landed  him,  not 
in  jail,  but  in  the  Bataillon  d'AJrique.  He 
had  served  in  that  for  two  years,  doing  his 
military  service  in  the  Bataillon  d'Afrique 
instead  of  jail,  while  working  off  his  five 
year  sentence,  and  then  war  being  declared, 
167 


1 68        The  Backwash  of  War 

his  regiment  was  transferred  from  Morocco 
to  France,  to  Flanders,  to  the  front  line 
trenches,  and  in  course  of  time  he  arrived 
one  day  at  the  hospital  with  a  piece  of  shell 
in  his  spleen. 

He  was  pretty  ill  when  brought  in,  and 
if  he  had  died  promptly,  as  he  should  have 
done,  it  would  have  been  better.  But  it 
happened  at  that  time  that  there  was  a  sur- 
geon connected  with  the  hospital  who  was 
bent  on  making  a  reputation  for  himself, 
and  this  consisted  in  trying  to  prolong  the 
lives  of  wounded  men  who  ought  normally 
and  naturally  to  have  died.  So  this  surgeon 
worked  hard  to  save  Grammont,  and  cer- 
tainly succeeded  in  prolonging  his  life,  and 
in  prolonging  his  suffering,  over  a  very  con- 
siderable portion  of  time.  He  worked  hard 
over  him,  and  he  used  on  him  everything 
he  could  think  of,  everything  that  money 
could  buy.  Every  time  he  had  a  new  idea 
as  to  treatment,  no  matter  how  costly  it 


A  Citation  169 

might  be,  he  mentioned  it  to  the  Directrice, 
who  sent  to  Paris  and  got  it.  All  the  while 
Grammont  remained  in  bed,  in  very  great 
agony,  the  surgeon  making  copious  notes  on 
the  case,  noting  that  under  such  and  such 
circumstances,  under  conditions  such  as 
the  following,  such  and  such  remedies  and 
treatment  proved  futile  and  valueless. 
Grammont  had  a  hole  in  his  abdomen,  when 
he  entered,  about  an  inch  long.  After  about 
a  month,  this  hole  was  scientifically  increased 
to  a  foot  in  length,  rubber  drains  stuck  out 
in  all  directions,  and  went  inwards  as  well, 
pretty  deep,  and  his  pain  was  enhanced  a 
hundredfold,  while  his  chances  of  recovery 
were  not  bright.  But  Grammont  had  a 
good  constitution,  and  the  surgeon  worked 
hard  over  him,  for  if  he  got  well,  it  woidd  be 
a  wonderful  case,  and  the  surgeon's  reputa- 
tion would  benefit.  Grammont  bore  it  all 
very  patiently,  and  did  not  ask  to  be  allowed 
to  die,  as  many  of  them  did,  for  since  he  was 


170       The  Backwash  of  War 

of  the  Bataillon  d'Afrique,  such  a  request 
would  be  equivalent  to  asking  for  a  remission 
of  sentence — a  sentence  which  the  courts 
averred  he  justly  deserved  and  merited. 
They  took  no  account  of  the  fact  that  his 
ethics  were  those  of  a  wandering  juggler, 
turning  somersaults  on  a  carpet  at  the  public 
fetes  of  Paris,  and  had  been  polished  off  by 
contact  with  the  men  and  women  he  had 
encountered  in  his  capacity  of  gargon  d'hotel, 
in  a  fifth-rate  hotel  near  Montmartre.  On 
the  contrary,  they  rather  expected  of  him 
the  decencies  and  moralities  that  come  from 
careful  nurture,  and  these  not  being  forth- 
coming, they  had  sent  him  to  the  Bataillon 
d'Afrique,  where  his  eccentricities  would  be 
of  no  danger  to  the  public. 

So  Grammont  continued  to  suffer,  over  a 
period  of  several  long  months,  and  he  was 
sufficiently  cynical,  owing  to  his  short  experi- 
ence of  life,  to  realize  that  the  surgeon,  who 
worked  over  him  so  constantly  and  solici- 


A  Citation  171 

tously,  was  not  solely  and  entirely  disin- 
terested in  his  efforts  to  make  him  well. 
Grammont  had  no  life  to  return  to,  that  was 
the  trouble.  Everyone  knew  it.  The 
siu-geon  knew  it,  and  the  orderlies  knew  it, 
and  his  comrades  in  the  adjoining  beds  knew 
it — he  had  absolutely  no  future  before  him, 
and  there  was  not  much  sense  in  trying  to 
make  him  well  enough  to  return  to  Paris,  a 
hopeless  cripple.  He  lay  in  hospital  for 
several  months,  suffering  greatly,  but  greatly 
patient.  During  that  time,  he  received  no 
letters,  for  there  was  no  one  to  write  to  him. 
He  was  an  apache,  he  belonged  to  a  criminal 
regiment,  and  he  had  no  family  anyhow,  and 
his  few  friends,  tattooed  all  over  the  body 
like  himself,  were  also  members  of  the  same 
regiment,  and  as  such,  unable  to  do  much  for 
him  in  civil  life  after  the  war.  Such  it  is  to 
be  ajoyeux,  to  belong  to  a  regiment  of  crimi- 
nals, and  to  have  no  family  to  speak  of. 
Grammont  knew  that  it  would  be  better 


172        The  Backwash  of  War 

for  him  to  die,  but  he  did  not  like  to  protest 
against  this  painful  prolonging  of  his  Hfe. 
He  was  pretty  well  sick  of  life,  but  he  had 
to  submit  to  the  kind  treatment  meted  out 
to  him,  to  twist  his  mouth  into  a  wry  smile 
when  the  Directrice  asked  him  each  day  if 
he  was  not  better,  and  to  accept  without 
wincing  all  the  newest  devices  that  the 
siu-geon  discovered  for  him.  There  was  some 
sense  in  saving  other  people's  lives,  but  there 
was  no  sense  in  saving  his.  But  the  surgeon, 
who  was  working  for  a  reputation,  worked 
hand  in  hand  with  the  Directrice  who  wanted 
her  hospital  to  make  a  reputation  for  saving 
the  lives  of  the  grands  blesses.  Grammont 
was  the  victim  of  circumstances,  as  usual, 
but  it  was  all  in  his  understanding  of  life, 
this  being  caught  up  in  the  ambitions  of 
others,  so  he  had  to  submit. 

After  about  three  months  of  torture,  during 
which  time  he  grew  weaker  and  smelled 
worse  every  day,  it  finally  dawned  on  the 


A  Citation  I73 

nurse  that  perhaps  this  life-saving  business 
was  not  wholly  desirable.  If  he  got  "well," 
in  the  mildest  acceptation  of  the  term,  he 
would  be  pretty  well  disabled,  and  useless 
and  good  for  nothing.  And  if  he  was  never 
going  to  get  well,  for  which  the  prospects 
seemed  bright  enough,  why  force  him  along 
through  more  weeks  of  suffering,  just  to  try 
out  new  remedies?  Society  did  not  want 
him,  and  he  had  no  place  in  it.  Besides, 
he  had  done  his  share,  in  the  trenches,  in 
protecting  its  best  traditions. 

Then  they  all  began  to  notice,  suddenly, 
that  in  bed  Grammont  was  displaying  rather 
nice  quaHties,  such  as  you  would  not  expect 
from  Sijoyeux,  a  social  outcast.  He  appeared 
to  be  extremely  patient,  and  while  his  face 
twisted  up  into  knots  of  pain,  most  of  the 
time,  he  did  not  cry  out  and  disturb  the  ward 
as  he  might  have  done.  This  was  nice  and 
considerate,  and  other  good  traits  were  dis- 
covered too.    He  was  not  a  nuisance,  he  was 


174       The  Backwash  of  War 

not  exacting,  he  did  not  demand  unreason- 
able things,  or  refuse  to  submit  to  imreason- 
able  things,  when  these  were  demanded  of 
him.  In  fact,  he  seemed  to  accept  his  pain 
as  God-given,  and  with  a  fataHsm  which 
in  some  ways  was  rather  admirable.  He 
could  not  help  smelling  like  that,  for  he  was 
full  of  rubber  drains  and  of  gauze  drains,  and 
if  the  doctor  was  too  busy  to  dress  his  woimds 
that  day,  and  so  put  him  off  till  the  next,  it 
was  not  his  fault  for  smelling  so  vilely.  He 
did  not  raise  any  disturbance,  nor  make  any 
complaint,  on  certain  days  when  he  seemed 
to  be  neglected.  Any  extra  discomfort  that 
he  was  obliged  to  bear,  he  bore  stoically. 
Altogether,  after  some  four  months  of  this, 
it  was  discovered  that  Grammont  had  rather 
a  remarkable  character,  a  character  which 
merited  some  sort  of  recognition.  He  seemed 
to  have  rather  heroic  qualities  of  endurance, 
of  bravery,  of  discipline.  Nor  were  they 
the  heroic  qualities  that  suddenly  develop 


A  Citation  I75 

in  a  moment  of  exaltation,  but  on  the  con- 
trary, they  were  developed  by  months  of 
extreme  agony,  of  extreme  bodily  pain.  He 
could  have  been  so  disagreeable,  had  he 
chosen.  And  as  he  cared  so  little  to  have 
his  life  saved,  his  goodness  could  not  have 
been  due  to  that.  It  seemed  that  he  was 
merely  very  decent,  very  considerate  of  others, 
and  wanted  to  give  as  little  trouble  as  he 
coiild,  no  matter  what  took  place.  Only 
he  got  thinner  and  weaker,  and  more  and 
more  gentle,  and  at  last  after  five  months 
of  this,  the  Directrice  was  touched  by  his 
conduct  and  suggested  that  here  was  a  case 
of  heroism  as  well  worthy  of  the  Croix  de 
Guerre  as  were  the  more  spectacular  move- 
ments on  the  battlefield.  It  took  a  few 
weeks  longer,  of  gentle  suggestion  on  her 
part,  to  convey  this  impression  to  the  Gene- 
ral, but  at  last  the  General  entered  into  cor- 
respondence with  the  officers  of  the  regiment 
to  which  Grammont  belonged,  and  it  then 


176       The  Backwash  of  War 

transpired  that  as  a  soldier  Grammont  had 
displayed  the  same  qualities  of  consideration 
for  others  and  of  discipline,  that  he  was  now 
displaying  in  a  hospital  bed.  Finally  one 
day,  the  news  came  that  Grammont  was  to 
be  decorated.  Everyone  else  in  the  ward, 
who  deserved  it,  had  been  decorated  long 
ago,  naturally,  for  they  had  not  belonged  to 
the  Bataillon  d'Afrique.  Their  services  had 
been  recognized  long  ago.  Now,  however, 
after  these  many  months  of  suffering,  Gram- 
mont was  to  receive  the  Croix  de  Guerre. 
He  was  nearly  dead  by  this  time.  When 
told  the  news,  he  smiled  faintly.  He  did 
not  seem  to  care.  It  seemed  to  make  very 
little  impression  upon  him.  Yet  it  should 
have  made  an  impression,  for  he  was  a  con- 
victed criminal,  and  it  was  a  condescension 
that  he  should  be  so  honoured  at  all.  He 
had  somehow  won  this  honour,  this  token  of 
forgiveness,  by  suffering  so  long,  so  uncom- 
plainingly.    However,    a    long    delay    took 


A  Citation  177 

place,  although  finally  his  papers  came,  his 
citation,  in  which  he  was  cited  in  the  orders 
of  the  regiment  as  having  done  a  very  brave 
deed,  imder  fire.  He  smiled  a  Httle  at  that. 
It  had  taken  place  so  long  ago,  this  time 
when  he  had  done  the  deed,  received  the 
wound  that  kept  him  suffering  so  long.  It 
seemed  so  little  worth  while  to  acknowledge 
it  now,  after  all  these  months,  when  he  was 
just  ready  to  leave. 

Then  more  delay  took  place,  and  Gram- 
mont  got  weaker,  and  the  orderlies  said 
among  themselves  that  if  the  General  was 
ever  going  to  decorate  this  man,  that  he  had 
better  hurry  up.  However,  so  long  a  time 
had  passed  that  it  did  not  much  matter. 
Grammont  was  pleased  with  his  citation. 
It  seemed  to  make  it  all  right  for  him,  some- 
how. It  seemed  to  give  him  standing  among 
his  fellow  patients.  The  hideous  tattoo 
marks  on  his  arms  and  legs,  chest  and  back, 
which    proclaimed    him    an    apache,    which 


178        The  Backwash  of  War 

showed  him  such  every  time  his  wound  was 
dressed,  were  about  to  be  overlaid  with  a 
decoration  for  bravery  upon  the  field  of 
battle.  But  still  the  General  did  not  come. 
Grammont  grew  very  weak  and  feeble  and 
his  patience  became  exhausted.  He  held 
on  as  long  as  he  could.  So  he  died  finally, 
after  a  long  pull,  just  twenty  minutes  before 
the  General  arrived  with  his  medals. 

Paris, 
27  June,  1916 


An  Incident 


179 


AN  INCIDENT 

A  T  the  intersection  of  the  rue  du  Bac  and 
■^^  the  Boulevard  St.  Germain  rises  the 
statue  of  Claude  Chappe,  rising  like  a  rock  in 
the  midst  of  the  stream  of  traffic,  and  like 
a  rock  splitting  the  stream  and  diverting 
it  into  currents  which  flow  east  and  west, 
north  and  south,  smoothly  and  without 
collision.  In  guiding  the  stream  of  traffic 
and  directing  its  orderly  flow,  the  statue  of 
Claude  Chappe  is  greatly  assisted  by  the 
presence  of  an  agent  de  police,  with  a  pic- 
turesque cape  and  a  pictiuresque  sword,  and 
who  controls  the  flow  of  vehicles  with  as 
much  precision  as  a  London  policeman, 
although  there  are  those  who  profess  that 
a  London  policeman  is  the  only  one  who 
understands  the  business.  Before  the  war, 
i8i 


1 82        The  Backwash  of  War 

when  the  omnibuses  ran,  the  agent  de  police 
was  always  on  duty ;  since  the  war,  when  the 
Paris  omnibuses  are  all  at  the  Front,  carry- 
ing meat  to  the  soldiers,  there  are  certain 
times  dining  the  day  when  the  whole  respon- 
sibility for  traffic  regulation  falls  upon  the 
statue  of  Claude  Chappe.  It  was  at  one  of 
these  times,  when  Claude  Chappe  was  stand- 
ing head  in  air  as  usual,  and  failed  to  regard 
the  comings  and  goings  of  the  street,  that 
this  incident  occurred. 

Down  on  the  Quai,  an  officer  of  the  French 
army  stepped  into  a  little  victoria,  a  shabby 
little  voiture  de  place,  which  trotted  him  up 
the  rue  du  Bac  and  then  essayed  to  take  him 
along  the  Boulevard  St.  Germain  to  the 
Ministhe  de  la  Guerre.  Coming  along  the 
boiilevard  in  the  opposite  direction,  was  a 
little  lad  of  fifteen,  bending  low  over  the 
handle  bars  of  a  tricycle  delivery  wagon, 
the  box  of  which  contained  enough  kilos  to 
have  taxed  a  strong  man  or  an  old  horse. 


An  Incident  183 

Men  are  scarce  in  Paris,  however,  and  the 
little  delivery  boy,  who  could  not  possibly 
have  been  available  for  the  army  for  another 
three  years,  was  doing  a  man's  work,  or  a 
horse's  work,  as  you  please.  The  French 
are  a  thrifty  race,  and  the  possibilities  being 
that  the  war  will  all  be  over  before  that  time, 
it  mattered  little  whether  this  particular  boy 
developed  a  hernia,  or  tuberculosis,  or  any 
other  malady  which  might  unfit  him  for 
future  military  service.  At  present  he  was 
earning  money  for  his  patron ,  which  was  all 
that  really  mattered.  So  the  little  boy  on 
the  tricycle,  head  down,  ran  squarely  into  the 
horse  of  the  shabby  victoria,  conveying 
the  French  officer,  and  the  agent  de  police 
was  absent,  and  the  statue  of  Claude  Chappe 
stood,  as  usual,  head  in  air. 

Quite  a  melee  ensued.  The  old  horse, 
which  should  long  ago  have  been  in  a  butch- 
er's shop,  avoided  the  tricycle,  with  true 
French  thrift,  but  stepped  squarely  upon  the 


1 84       The  Backwash  of  War 

face  of  the  little  boy  sprawling  under  its 
hoofs.  Another  hoof  planted  itself  on  the 
fingers  of  the  lad's  right  hand.  War  itself 
could  not  have  been  more  disastrous.  The 
youth  rose  to  his  feet,  screaming.  The 
cabby  cursed.  A  crowd  collected,  and  the 
officer  in  the  little  carriage  leaned  back  and 
twirled  the  ends  of  his  neat  moustache. 
The  agent  de  police,  who  should  have  been  on 
duty  at  the  statue,  arrived  hastily  from  a 
nearby  caf 6.  He  always  took  two  hours  off 
for  lunch,  in  good  Parisian  fashion,  and  he 
was  obliged  on  this  occasion  to  cut  his  lunch 
hour  short  by  fifteen  minutes.  Everyone 
was  frightfully  annoyed,  but  no  one  was  more 
annoyed  than  the  officer  in  the  cab,  on  his 
way  to  the  Minister  of  War. 

He  was  so  annoyed,  so  bored,  that  he  sat 
impertiu-bable,  one  arm  lying  negligently 
along  the  back  of  the  seat,  the  fingers  of  the 
other  hand  caressing  the  Cross  of  the  Legion 
of  Honour,  upon  his  breast.    His  eyes  rolled 


An  Incident  185 

upwards,  as  if  seeking  the  aeroplane  which 
was  not,  at  that  moment,  flying  over  Paris. 
The  cabby  got  down  from  his  seat,  and  with 
much  vociferation  called  upon  the  officer 
to  witness  that  it  was  not  his  fault.  The 
crowd,  who  had  not  witnessed  the  accident, 
crowded  round  the  policeman,  giving  testi- 
mony to  what  they  had  not  seen.  The  sob- 
bing boy  was  led  into  a  chemist's.  Still  the 
people  did  not  disperse.  They  pressed  round 
the  cab,  and  began  shouting  to  the  disin- 
terested officer.  The  officer  who  cared  not 
where  the  old  horse  had  stepped.  The  officer 
who  continued  to  loll  back  against  the  shabby 
cushions,  to  look  upward  at  the  sky,  to 
remain  indifferent  to  the  taximeter,  which 
skipped  briskly  from  eighty -five  centimes  to 
ninety-five  centimes,  and  continued  ticking 
on.  Women  crowded  round  the  cab,  regard- 
ing its  occupant.  Was  this  one  who  com- 
manded their  sons  at  the  Front,  who  had 
therefore  seen  so  much,   been  through  so 


1 86       The  Backwash  of  War 

much,  that  the  sight  of  a  Httle  boy  stamped 
on  meant  nothing  to  him?  Had  he  seen  so 
much  suffering  en  gros  that  it  meant  nothing 
to  him  en  detail?  Or  was  this  his  attitude 
to  all  suffering?  Was  this  the  Nation's  atti- 
tude to  the  suffering  of  their  sons?  Or  was 
this  oflBcer  one  who  had  never  been  to  the 
Front,  an  embusque,  one  of  the  protected 
ones,  who  occupied  soft  snaps  in  the  rear, 
safe  places  from  which  to  draw  their  pay? 
The  crowd  increased  every  minute.  They 
speculated  volubly.  They  surrounded  the 
cab,  voicing  their  speculations.  They  finally 
became  so  unbearable  that  the  officer's  bore- 
dom vanished.  His  annoyance  became  such, 
his  impatience  at  the  delay  became  such  that 
he  slid  down  from  the  shabby  cushions,  and 
without  paying  his  fare,  disappeared  in  the 
direction  of  the  Ministhre  de  la  Guerre, 


A  Selection  from  the 
Catalogue  of 

C.  P.  PUTNAM'S  SONS 


Ceaapl«t«  Catalo|(u«  ••»! 
on  applioatioa 


The   Night  Cometh 

By 
Paul  Bourget 

Translated  by  Frederic  Lees 

72°.    $135 

Perhaps  the  most  important  work  of 
imagination  yet  written  under  the  in- 
fluence of  the  war.  A  French  military 
hospital  is  the  scene  of  the  story,  and 
its  chief  characters  are  a  famous  Paris 
surgeon  and  a  young  wounded  officer, 
whose  fervent  Catholic  piety  is  in 
sharp  contrast  with  the  doctor's  philo- 
sophic materialism.  Death  threatens 
both,  and  their  opposing  theories  with 
regard  to  it  are  displayed  in  their  re- 
lation to  a  drama  of  the  most  intense 
human  passion. 

G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  London 


Halt! 
Who's  There? 

By  the  Author  of 
"Aunt  Sarah  and  the  War" 

75  cents  net     Postage  additional 

A  volume  comparable  to  Auat  Sarah  and 
the  War  from  the  pen  of  the  author  of  that 
book.  The  scene  is  laid  in  a  hospital,  but  the 
cases  recorded  are  those  of  men  who,  though 
wounded  in  body,  are  spiritually  whole.  It  is 
the  ideals  of  England, — the  essential  England 
that,  when  the  hour  strikes,  is  all  courage — 
that  manifest  themselves  throughout.  And  be 
it  said  that  it  is  an  epitome  not  only  of  the 
spirit  of  England  but  of  the  United  Kingdom, 
with  the  emphasis  on  the  united.  There  is  a 
fine  strain  of  kindness  and  broad  sympathy 
running  through  the  book,  and  much  of  poign- 
ancy in  the  personal  dramas  glimpsed  through 
its  pages. 

G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  London 


A  TALL  SHIP 

ON  OTHER  NAVAL  OCCASIONS 
BY  BARTIMEUS 

i2°,    PICTURE  WRAPPER.    $100 

Tales  descriptive  of  life  in  the  British 
Navy  under  stress  of  war-time  condi- 
tions— the  life  of  the  officers'  mess,  and 
the  stoke-hole— the  grime  as  well  as  the 
glory.  Vivid  pictures  of  the  ache  of 
parting,  of  the  strain  of  long  waiting 
for  the  enemy,  of  sinking  ships  and 
struggles  in  the  waves— and  also  of 
the  bright  side  that  not  even  war  can 
extinguish. 

G.  P.  PUTNAM'S  SONS 
NEW  YORK  LONDON 


News  from 
Somewhere 

By 
James  Milne 

Author  of  "The  Romance  of  a  Pro-Consul,''  etc 

12'*.    $1.50  net.    Frontispiece 

"  Many  things  seen,  heard,  and  thought 
during  travels  at  home,  on  sea  and  oversea, 
in  the  war-time  which  we  rail  'Armageddon.* 
It  is  a  chronicle  of  war  impressions  gathered 
during  travel,  near  and  far,  on  its  edges  red 
and  jagged.  ** 

"  This  indeed  is  a  book  of  the  war  but  it  is 
not  like  the  others.  There  is  in  it  nothing 
that  is  harsh,  cruel,  ugly,  such  as  there  must 
be  in  nearly  every  other  volume  that  is 
wrought  about  Armageddon.  There  is  sad- 
ness in  it  but  it  is  a  sweet  sadness.  There  is 
an  immensity  of  pathos.  There  is  much  that 
is  beautiful.  And  all  of  it  is  true. " — The 
Daily  Telegraph,  ^ 

"  Great  m  spirit  ...  a  book  that  will  surely 
outlive  the  war.  " — The  Graphic, 

G.  p.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  London 


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